NBA Free Agency Winners and Losers

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With the NBA free agency season winding down, I decided to stop procrastinating and to recap the ups and down of the hectic free agency period. What better way to do that than with a good old winners and losers column? Let’s start with the most obvious example.

Cleveland Cavaliers: Winners

Gee, I don’t know… They didn’t have that great of a summer. All they got was the best player alive, who, just by being in Cleveland:

  1. Immediately made them into title contenders and
  2. Made all of the valuable veterans chasing rings come to Cleveland

In addition to getting LeBron, they have a bunch of young, cheap, and valuable assets and could get Kevin Love.

As I said, not a particularly good July for the Cavs.

Sacramento Kings: Losers

What the hell are they doing??? Here are two facts that shed light on why the Kings have been consistently one of the worst teams in basketball for the last decade:

  1. They let their young, talented, restricted free agent point guard (Isaiah Thomas) leave for Phoenix so they could instead save money by picking up a career backup (Darren Collison) instead. How much did they save? About a million dollars per year for the next three years (and seven mil in the fourth year). They say they have some advanced stats that show that Collison is better than Thomas, but I, like most observers, am skeptical.
  2. They’re currently ducking the luxury tax line by just under a million dollars. That’s normally fine (for instance, the Thunder are also just under the luxury tax) but they’re spending a ton of money for a lottery team with no upside.

That seems like a loss to me.

Houston Rockets: Losers

Well, the Rockets are still in a good position for the future, with two stars in Howard and Harden, along with plenty of cap flexibility. They have the normal number of picks (the 1st rounder that they traded to the Lakers with Jeremy Lin is replaced by the 1st rounder they got from the Pelicans for Omer Asik) so they’re not completely screwed like the two New York teams, and they’ve got a top-notch GM who isn’t completely incompetent. Due to Houston’s positive long-term outlook, it’s strange to see them on the list as losers.

The reason why their summer wasn’t a success is due to their failed attempts at landing the upper tier free agents available. They dumped off Asik to New Orleans and Lin to Los Angeles to create cap space to sign free agents. That’s normally commendable, but when you miss out on the best free agents, you suddenly find yourself without two valuable rotation players.

Not only did the Rockets miss out on Melo and Chris Bosh, but they also decided not to keep Chandler Parsons. Their plan for free agency was to let Parsons go into restricted free agency, keeping his cap hold at about 2-3 million and to get rid of Lin and Asik, thereby creating enough cap space to sign a max level free agent. Subsequently, the plan was to sign a max level free agent while remaining under the cap. They would then be able to go over the cap to resign Parsons, giving them a big four of Harden, Howard, Parsons, and Bosh/Melo.
Of course, when Parsons signed an offer sheet with the Mavs, the Rockets only had three days to sign a free agent and then to resign Parsons. They were unable to do so, and then, at the end of the three-day waiting period, they simply let Parsons go.

To replace Parsons at the 3, Houston signed Trevor Ariza. Ariza is older than Parsons and is signed to a longer contract, although for less per year, meaning that Houston will have more cap space for additional free agent signings. Ariza, outside of the contract itself, is a good signing for Houston. He shoots 3s as well as Parsons and plays much better defense, which is especially important on a team with Harden, a defensive sieve. Still, he’s not Bosh, Melo, or even Parsons.

Houston came into this free agent period with high hopes, and left with less than they came in with. The team that suffered a first round playoff exit to Portland just got worse. That’s a pretty bad summer.

LeBron James: Winner

Let’s list the four biggest ways that LeBron won the summer, he:

  1. Goes home to Cleveland, erasing much of the pain from his brief defection in 2010
  2. Gets out of a deteriorating situation in Miami, where he would have been stuck with old and expensive teammates, where he would have had to carry his team every night (kinda like the late 2000s Cavs)
  3. Goes to the only place he could have gone to win titles without being branded a mercenary
  4. Gets a team where he either gets to play with a bunch of young stars who can save his legs, or with less young stars and Kevin Love, a top 10 player.

Not too shabby a summer for King James, huh?

Miami Heat: Losers           

Speaking of LBJ, the Heat had a bad summer. They lost the best player on the planet. That alone is enough to make a team a loser. However, outside of losing LeBron, the Heat actually had a surprisingly good summer.

They resigned Dwyane Wade to a more manageable contract. The kept Chris Bosh, who’ll become their new franchise player. If Bosh can keep up his defense while shouldering the offensive burden, the Heat will be in good shape.

In addition to the players they resigned, they also signed a few good free agents. They signed Luol Deng to replace LeBron (if anyone can truly do so) at the 3. They got Josh McRoberts, a 3-point-shooting, floor-spacing big man, who fits well with Miami’s offensive philosophy of passing, movement, and space. They also acquired Danny Granger, a veteran like the Heat have signed in years past, but, unlike those prior veterans, he’s (probably) not washed up.

Although the Heat lost LeBron, they had a pretty productive summer. However, next year they’ll almost certainly get worse after losing their best player and the strengthening of their in-conference rivals. That’s enough to make them losers.

Phoenix Suns: Winners

They are loaded. Perhaps not skill-wise, at least not yet, but there are really no teams out there that have a better long-term outlook than the Suns. You could make a case for the Hawks. You could make a case for the Sixers. But really, no team compares to the Suns.

Last year they won 48 games when they were trying to lose. Phoenix won with a young team that can only get better. They had four first round draft picks in this year’s draft. They aren’t hamstrung by cap concerns. The Suns can resign Eric Bledsoe and will still have max level cap space next summer. Even if they can’t sign a free agent, they can still trade for a star. They have a ton of young, cheap, and movable assets. For a team that’s pretty good already, adding a max level player would make them elite.

Still, that’s their long-term outlook. We’re only looking at this summer, though. They had one notable free agent acquisition, signing Isaiah Thomas away from Sacramento. In Phoenix’s two-point-guard offensive system, Thomas will be a good fit. However, one free agent signing is generally not enough to make a team a winner. In this case, though, it’s what the Suns don’t do (or at least don’t need to do) that makes them winners.

Originally, they offered Bledsoe 48 million over 4 years. Bledsoe turned them down. They moved on and signed Thomas for 4 years and about 27-28 million dollars. The advantage here is twofold. One, they get a cheaper replacement for Bledsoe. Two, they can afford to play hardball with Bledsoe, forcing him to accept less money to come back to Phoenix.

If Bledsoe comes back, great! They have another good player. If he doesn’t, that’s great, too! They have extra cap space to use to improve up and down their roster.

Now, if Phoenix hadn’t signed Thomas, they would have either lost Bledsoe or been forced to give him a cap-crippling contract that would mess up their cap space for years to come, just so they could keep together their core from last year.

The Thomas signing, because of all of these reasons, is one of the most underrated signings of free agency and is enough to make the Suns winners.

Indiana Pacers: Losers

The Pacers stagnated, not signing anyone of great import. However, they lost Lance Stephenson, a brutal blow.

Despite his antics, Stephenson was one of two players on Indiana last year (in addition to Paul George) who knew the definition of the word ‘score’. If you subtract him from a horrendous Indiana offense and don’t replace him with anyone good, that’s a combination for disaster.

Even the Pacers’ vaunted defense will be affected. Stephenson was a big part of the defense with his long arms and physical defense. He’s also valuable on defense because of his ability to guard the 3, in addition to his position at 2-guard.

Stephenson’s ability to create offense along with his flexibility on defense will be sorely missed in Indiana.

Indiana’s loss of Stephenson coupled with the gains other Eastern contenders made this offseason is enough to make them losers.

Charlotte Hornets: Winners

The Hornets (it feels weird calling them that) were the team that signed Stephenson away from the Pacers. It was a great signing for them. Their, at times, stagnant offense gets a big boost from adding someone who can make his own shot and (kinda like a linebacker) is able to bully his way to the rim for easy layups.

Steve Clifford’s defensive system gets another versatile, long-armed defender. Adding another elite defender to a team that was among the league leaders in defensive efficiency last season? That’s a recipe for a top-3 defense.

With an elite defense, a decent offense, and Lance Stephenson (not to mention an NBA great running the show), could Charlotte be turning into Indiana 2.0.? That potential is more than enough to make this a successful summer for Charlotte.

NBA Fans: Winners

We were the biggest winners of all. Let’s just quickly run through all the ways we won the summer. We got…

  1. Two weeks of nonstop excitement, constantly refreshing our Twitter feeds and ESPN to see if an important free agent had signed.
  2. To dream for the future, imagining our favorite team acquiring LBJ, Melo, Bosh, or whoever else.
  3. To see new teams rise, young teams get even better, and established teams get worse.
  4. To feverishly work out trade scenarios on the ESPN Trade Machine that’d net our team Kevin Love
  5. To watch a player make amends for one of the worst things to ever happen to a fan base in the history of sports

It’s been a helluva summer.

 

MLB Midseason Awards and Predictions

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The All Star Break is generally considered to be midway point of the MLB season. It’s weird because teams have already played anywhere from 91 games (Detroit) to 97 (Tampa Bay and the Dodgers). For those of you out there who aren’t exactly mathematicians, that’s more than halfway through the season. The mathematical midpoint of the season was a couple of weeks ago making it weird that people consider the season to be halfway over now, but if you think about how little sense this makes too long, you’ll get a headache, so let’s just move on.

The All Star Break is a good time to make predictions about the rest of the season. With the four day absence of baseball (the All Star Game doesn’t count), people are pretty desperate for anything related to actual baseball. Also, the sample size of nearly 100 games is large enough to extrapolate semi-meaningful information, making it easier to make logical and smart picks for the rest of the season.

Before you think that I’m just some idiot who doesn’t know how to make these predictions, I’d like to direct you to the two columns that I’ve written on here so far that deal with making picks. Here’s The World Cup Preview: https://sushionsports.wordpress.com/2014/06/13/the-world-cup-preview/. In it, before the tournament started, I pick three of the final four teams correctly, I pick the winner correctly, I do reasonably well picking the order of finishers in each group, and I predict that Brazil will collapse against Germany in the semifinals. Here’s The Knockout Rounds Preview, in which I get 13 out of the 16 games correct in addition to doubling up on what I predicted before the tournament started: https://sushionsports.wordpress.com/2014/06/27/the-knockout-rounds-preview/. Read through the articles; you might be entertained, but you’ll also see that I wasn’t too bad.

Now I’ll admit that the last 130 words were pretty much just an excuse for me to brag about my successes, but still, can’t I be proud? If I made a 200 dollar bet on Germany to win it all before the tournament started (if gambling were legal), that 200 dollar bet would have returned 1100 dollars (according to Bovada). Not a bad profit.

All this aside, I like to think that I’m capable of foreseeing a few things, especially something as (relatively) predictable as MLB.

We’ll swing through the division winners and wild cards and move on to the major award winners before finishing up with the playoff picks.

Something you might want to know before we get started: this column is really, really, really long. Don’t worry: I won’t be offended if you read part of it and come back later to read some more. Anyways, after that 430 word preamble, let’s get started!

AL East: Baltimore Orioles

This is easily the most wide open division in baseball. All five teams are still in it, and no one would be particularly surprised if one team pulled off an incredible second half to win the division. I’m going with the safest pick in the Orioles.

For one thing, they’re already in first place, giving them a cushion over the rest of the teams.

They’ve also got some great hitting. Adam Jones has been spectacular as always, Nelson Cruz is having a breakout season at 34 (PEDs, anyone?) and they’ve had a surprise contributor in Steve Pearce, who’s been very good since he was brought up. Even Chris Davis isn’t too bad, although he’s certainly not at the heights that he reached last season.

The biggest reason is that they’ve got the least noticeable flaws of anyone in their division. Their only problem is a slightly leaky rotation, stemming mostly from the struggles of their prized free agent, 50 million dollar man, Ubaldo Jimenez.

The Blue Jays have been struggling since their hot start to the season and have no consistency at almost any part of their roster. Edwin Encarnacion got injured and will be out for a few weeks. All they have to do is find another guy who has 26 homers and 70 RBIs through the All Star Break because, you know, those types of players grow on trees.

Boston’s been completely unable to hit.

The Rays are shaking off a slow start but are still in last place. It’s impossible to pick them because of the risk that Andrew Friedman decides to rebuild their farm system by trading away David Price (who’s had an incredible two months worth of starts) and Ben Zobrist.

New York’s been dealing with injuries everywhere, (no surprise as the average age of their 25 man roster is probably around 48) they have no infield, their prized free agents haven’t worked out, and the only one that did, Masashiro Tanaka, is on the DL for at least six weeks.

If Toronto adds a big name player through the trade market as they’ve been rumored to be trying to do, it could change the whole outlook of the race. Outside of that, there’s nothing else that could make the division change much. The Yankees have too many holes to fix and Boston can’t find seven quality hitters to replace everyone in their lineup other than Brock Holt and David Ortiz. Tampa Bay never adds payroll and, if they made a splash, it would be more likely that they trade away David Price rather than trading for reinforcements.

The decision to choose the Orioles to win the AL East doesn’t stem from confidence in them as much as the lack of any serious competition.

For the sake of completeness, at the end of each division, I’ll put down my picks for the rest of the division. For the AL East, I’ve got Tampa Bay, Toronto, Boston, then New York.

AL Central: Detroit Tigers

Again, who’s going to compete with them? The Twins and White Sox are still rebuilding, they definitely can’t. Cleveland’s pitching has fallen apart outside of Corey Kluber. Kansas City can’t hit because of the hugely disappointing seasons from Eric Hosmer, Billy Butler, Norichika Aoki, and more. There are really no serious contenders other than the Tigers for the AL Central crown.

Detroit isn’t winning it almost by default like the Orioles are; rather, they have a very good team on their own.

Despite trading Doug Fister over the winter for 40 cents on the dollar (Fister has a sub-3.00 ERA this year for the Nationals) they have a deep pitching staff. Justin Verlander’s been a disappointment this year, but there’s potential for a comeback. Remember, Verlander won the MVP only three years ago, in 2011. They’ve got Rick Porcello, who had one of the strangest box scores in recent memory, with a complete game shutout with no walks and no strikeouts. Anibal Sanchez and Max Scherzer are both high strikeout pitchers with good ERAs. Even Drew Smyly, the guy who they gave Fister’s rotation spot to has been pretty good. That’s a pretty intimidating playoff rotation.

Their lineup is even better than their rotation. They’ve got Miguel Cabrera, looking to capture a third straight AL MVP, Victor Martinez, and Ian Kinsler. They’ve got a surprise star in JD Martinez who has absolutely mashed this year.

Overall, Detroit has such a deep team (outside of its shaky bullpen) that it’s impossible to go against them.

I think the rest of the division will go Kansas City, Cleveland, Chicago, Minnesota.

AL West: Oakland Athletics

The best team in the majors got even better after trading for Jeff Samardzija and Jason Hammel of the Cubs. Oakland’s rotation is so deep that despite having multiple injuries to starting pitchers, they had to send down a guy with a 3.55 ERA (Tommy Milone) because they didn’t have a spot for him in the rotation. That’s some serious depth.

Their lineup is loaded as well, with Josh Donaldson following last year’s breakout season with 20 homers and 65 RBIs so far this year and Brandon Moss having already hit 21 homers and knocked in 66 guys. They’ve got the best catching platoon in the game with Derek Norris (who should have started the All Star Game over both Matt Wieters and Salvador Perez) and John Jaso. Yoenis Cespedes, who just won his second consecutive Home Run Derby, bats third. Quite simply, the Athletics are loaded.

The best thing about Oakland is how deep they are. They’ve got good players up and down the roster, from 1 through 25. This depth makes them less susceptible to injuries.

The Angels and Mariners are both good teams, but none have the depth of the A’s. We’ll delve a little deeper into those two teams in about three or four paragraphs.

Texas and Houston are both garbage and inflate the win totals of the three teams lucky enough to be in the same division as them.

Anyways, Oakland’s easily the best team in the majors and should win their division.

After Oakland, I think it’ll be Los Angeles, Seattle, Houston, then Texas.

AL Wild Cards: 1. Los Angeles Angels (if you want to be picky) of Anaheim 2. Seattle Mariners

Most important question: why do the Angels feel the need to tack on “of Anaheim” to the end of the name? It sounds a little stuck up if you ask me (which you didn’t, but whatever).

In actual baseball, the Angels are a team built for the regular season with a loaded lineup, a passable rotation, and a train wreck of a bullpen. Luckily for them, the market is saturated with relief pitchers and it shouldn’t be too hard. In fact, they’ve already gotten started, grabbing Joe Thatcher from Arizona and swapping their failed closer, Ernesto Frieri, for Pittsburgh’s failed closer, Jason Grilli. I think they’ll comfortably end up with the first wild card spot in the AL and breath down Oakland’s neck for the division crown near the end of the season.

The choice for the second wild card spot is tricky. I don’t particularly like any of the AL East teams, skill-wise, and Cleveland and Kansas City are all young teams with flaws (pitching outside of Kluber and having a passable offense respectively). That leaves only the Mariners. I’m okay with that. They’ve got Felix Hernandez and Hisashi Iwakuma, Fernando Rodney and Robinson Cano. Their biggest hole is the lack of production from right field and first base. Their DH spot has also been shaky. If they can solve a chunk of that problem by acquiring Marlon Byrd, Josh Willlingham, or someone like them, they’ll be in good position to make a run.

Now, if you were paying any attention at all, you may have noticed that I picked three AL playoff teams to come out of the AL West. This is because of they play in a division with the Astros and the Rangers. The two Texas teams are among the worst in baseball. Their crappiness gives the rest of the teams in their division a boost up.

NL East: Washington Nationals

I’m a Mets fan but even I can say that this division is really really bad. I mean, you’ve got the retirement home Phillies, the lots-of-young-guys-but-not-quite-there-yet Marlins and Mets, the perpetually underachieving Nationals, and the never-quite-puts-it-together Braves.

The Phillies certainly won’t be winning anything this year, outside of shot at a top 5 draft pick (they currently have the seventh-worst record in the MLB). The Marlins started off hot but are finally coming down from that high. They’ve got no shot. The Mets are 45-50 but have been unlucky; they should be 50-45 with just league average luck. Still, they’re a young team and are more likely than not to do worse in the second half. They’ll be good in 2015 and beyond, just not this year (I’m gonna keep telling myself that, hoping that it’s true). The Braves are overachieving, leaving just Washington. I’ve always thought for the past three years that Washington has a really good team. They simply have no holes. Every position is manned by a capable player. I think that this is the year that they finally put it together and that they’ll easily win the NL East.

I think the rest of the division goes Atlanta, New York, Miami, and Philadelphia.

NL Central: St. Louis Cardinals

Here’s another division (along with the NL and AL Easts) that no one seems to want to win. Four out of the five teams are within 3.5 games of the division lead so this division is completely up-for-grabs. We can easily rule out the Cubs because they’re continuing to build for the future, but outside of Chicago, the four other teams are more or less even.

In the end, I’ve got to pick St. Louis. They’ve got great pitching and their hitting should bounce back eventually. They’ve got a ton of injuries to key contributors such as Yadier Molina, Michael Wacha, and Jaime Garcia. Still, all of them (except for possibly Garcia) will be back by September, in time for the stretch run.
Cincinnati is dealing with injuries of its own. Joey Votto, Brandon Phillips, and Sean Marshall are all banged up. However, the Reds should find it harder to compensate for their injuries. Milwaukee wasn’t supposed to be a particularly good team this year, but after a surprisingly good start, they’ve cooled off considerably. Pittsburgh is doing the same thing it’s always done: having a far better record than their stats would suggest. It’s not unreasonable to expect them to drop off a cliff in the second half.

The best reason for the Cards is that they’ve done it before. They know what it takes to win the division. In a division with five lackluster teams, that’s the best reason to pick one of them.

I think the Reds will come in second, the Brew Crew will be third, the Buccos will take home fourth, and the Cubs will be comfortably in last.

NL West: Los Angeles Dodgers

It’s tough to go against a team that’s spending 238 million dollars. It’s also tough to go against a team that’s so loaded that elite, major-league ready prospects are stuck in the minors because the players in the big leagues are all too good to be sent down.

Three of the six worst teams in MLB reside in their division, pushing them up a few games. The only competition comes from the Giants, who, after a scorching start, have stunk for a month or two.

I think that the rest of the division will be, in order of finish, San Francisco, Colorado, Arizona, and San Diego.

NL Wild Cards: 1. San Francisco Giants 2. Atlanta Braves

The NL Wild Card race should be relatively uncompetitive this year. There are five teams that (according to my predictions) won’t win their division but are still competitive: San Fran, Atlanta, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, and Pittsburgh. The three NL Central teams should all beat up on one another, leaving the Giants and Braves standing. Additionally, the Giants and Braves have easy divisions and should be able to capitalize on that by taking advantage of the weaker teams they’ll face.

AL MVP: Mike Trout

Honestly, who else could it be? Miguel Cabrera has won the past two AL MVPs over Trout, largely due to old-school thinkers who don’t value advanced stats at all compared to the old stalwarts of RBIs and home runs. This year, however, in addition to thrashing Cabrera in advanced stats (as always), Trout is beating him in the regular stats as well, other than RBIs where he’s losing by two, 75-73. That difference is offset by his dominance in other categories. That combination, along with finally being on a playoff team, is why Trout should take home his first MVP.

NL MVP: Giancarlo Stanton

Stanton is, quite simply, a beast. He boasts enormous power; with 21 home runs, he’s tied with Troy Tulowitzki for the NL lead in the statistic. He leads the league in RBIs, with 63. He hits for average and gets on base a ton. He’s getting better production now that he’s playing with some good hitters, like Christian Yelich, Marcell Ozuna, Casey McGehee, and Garrett Jones.

Still, the NL MVP is wide open. You could make a convincing case for Tulowitzki, Paul Goldschmidt, and Andrew McCutchen. Picking this race is pretty much a crapshoot but Stanton’s my best bet based on his immense power and his capability of turning in a monstrous second half.

AL Cy Young: Felix Hernandez

King Felix is the obvious choice here. Chris Sale hasn’t pitched as many innings and David Price is still overcoming his poor start to the season, and he might get traded to an NL team. There are worries with Scott Kazmir and Garrett Richards that their seasons are outliers. Masashiro Tanaka got hurt. Justin Verlander stopped being Justin Verlander. There’s just not a huge amount of competition in the AL this year. That shouldn’t take away from Hernandez’s achievements, though. Through 144.1 innings, he’s got 154 strikeouts, a 2.12 ERA, and a 0.90 WHIP. If you care about wins, he’s got 11. He’s been the best pitcher on a playoff contender, and as long as neither he nor the Mariners suffer a prolonged second half swoon, he should win his second Cy Young in a landslide.

NL Cy Young: Clayton Kershaw

Just like with the MVP races, the real intrigue comes with the NL. Does the award go to someone with a breakout season (Julio Teheran)? Does it go to an extreme outlier season that probably won’t happen again (Johnny Cueto)? Does it go to someone who missed a month of the season but is undeniably the best pitcher in the game (Kershaw)? Or, does it go to someone who’s been consistently spectacular all year (Adam Wainwright)?

I choose Kershaw, and here’s why:

  1. Best pitcher in the game
  2. Plays for a guaranteed playoff team
  3. The innings gap between him and the rest of the starters will be far less noticeable by the end of the season
  4. He’s been unbelievably good so far this year

That’s more than enough for me. In case that wasn’t enough, Kershaw is more likely to win because he plays for a guaranteed playoff team while Wainwright (the probable runner-up) plays for Saint Louis, a contender for a playoff spot, but by no means a slam-dunk.

A stat that shows the huge gap between Kershaw and Wainwright: Kershaw has pitched 41.2 innings less than Wainwright but has 11 more strikeouts. That’s called dominance.

AL Rookie of the Year: Jose Abreu

This doesn’t have much intrigue either. It was shaping up to be a great race between Abreu and Masashiro Tanaka, but Tanaka got hurt, putting an end to that discussion.

Something reasonably important that I’d like to point out is that Tanaka is 25 and Abreu is 27. Wait, so why are these guys considered rookies again?

NL Rookie of the Year: Billy Hamilton

I racked my brains for ten minutes and couldn’t think of a single rookie in the NL worth noting, outside of Hamilton. There’s not much competition in this race either. Regardless, Hamilton is a well-deserving candidate. In addition to his well-documented speed (he’s got 38 stolen bases so far this year), he’s hitting .285, albeit with a pedestrian OPB of .319, quelling concerns that he wouldn’t be able to get on base to get steals in the big leagues. He’s even got 38 RBIs, a lot for a leadoff hitter. Hamilton is a solid choice for the NL ROY, despite there not being anyone else worth noting to compete with him.

AL Playoffs:

  1. Oakland
  2. Detroit
  3. Baltimore
  4. Los Angeles/Seattle

AL Wild Card Game: Seattle

The Angels are probably a better team overall than the Mariners, but they don’t have the shutdown ace that Seattle has in Felix Hernandez. King Felix should shut down Los Angeles in the wild card game, giving Seattle the victory.

ALDS: Oakland, Detroit

Oakland should easily put away Seattle with its superior pitching and hitting, along with its depth throughout the roster. The only position that Seattle is better than Oakland at is second base, where Seattle has Robinson Cano, compared to Oakland’s four-way platoon of Alberto Callaspo, Jed Lowrie, Nick Punto, and Eric Sogard. Outside of that position, the Athletics are better in every way.

Detroit should do the same to Baltimore, beating them with their combination of elite hitting and above average pitching. Baltimore doesn’t have great starting pitching which should doom them in a playoff series.
ALCS: Oakland

This sets up a rematch of Oakland-Detroit. Detroit has won the past two years, but neither team is the same. Justin Verlander’s not as good as he used to be and Doug Fister was traded to Washington, so the Tigers are at a slight disadvantage in pitching.

The two teams are just about neck and neck in hitting. Detroit has more star power, but Oakland has solid players up and down the order.

The place where the Athletics have a huge advantage is in the bullpen. Joe Nathan hasn’t been good at all closing for the Tigers, while the A’s have good setup men in Dan Otero and Luke Gregerson, along with an All Star closer in Sean Doolittle.

Oakland’s clearly a better team than Detroit, and that’s why I think they’ll exorcise their past demons to finally move on to the World Series.

NL Wild Card Game: Atlanta

As in the AL matchup, the team with the best starting pitcher will nearly always win. Julio Teheran is better than all of the Giants’ pitchers, like Matt Cain, Ryan Vogelsong, Tim Hudson, Madison Bumgarner, and Tim Lincecum. Because of that advantage, I think Atlanta will beat San Francisco.

NLDS: Los Angeles, Washington

Los Angeles should thrash Atlanta with its incredibly deep rotation and its elite lineup, especially as Julio Teheran, Atlanta’s ace, won’t be able to pitch the first game of the series if he pitches in the Wild Card game.
I think Washington will avenge its loss to the Cardinals from two seasons ago. Although St. Louis has the best pitcher in the series, Adam Wainwright, Washington hasn’t been wracked by pitching injuries, with Stephen Strasburg, Doug Fister, Jordan Zimmermann, and Gio Gonzalez, the likely members of their playoff rotation, all healthy. Even if one of them does get hurt, the Nats still have Tanner Roark as a solid backup plan.

NLCS: Los Angeles

Although Washington has great pitching, they can’t compare to the playoff rotation that the Dodgers can roll out: Clayton Kershaw, Zack Greinke, Josh Beckett, and Hyun-jin Ryu. The strength of the Nationals is pitching; take away that advantage and they’re suddenly not so intimidating anymore.

This sets up a California World Series between Oakland and Los Angeles, a matchup which should be a treat for all.

The World Series: Oakland

I went back and forth between the two teams about a thousand times before finally deciding.

Despite having less than a third of Los Angeles’ payroll, I think the Athletics will win the World Series.

The Dodgers have a ton of star power and are very top-heavy, while the Athletics have some stars, but have a ton more depth. Los Angeles is an incredible regular season team, and an incredible postseason team, but what happens if an important player gets injured. Then what happens? We’ve already seen that worst-case scenario with Oakland’s pitching staff and they rose to the occasion.

Also, I feel like, in every World Series, there’s one random player who makes a huge difference. Oakland has a ton of those guys. The Dodgers? Not so much. That’s a big reason why I’m picking the Oakland Athletics to win the 2014 World Series.

 

Improving the All Star Starting Lineup

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Sorry for the lack of content lately. I’ve been on vacation. I was in Los Angeles for a few days and I’m in New Zealand now, and for the next month or so. There may not be as many articles as there may normally be, but I’ll do my best to keep up.

On Sunday, the All Star rosters for each league were announced, outside of the final spot. As always, there were some notable omissions and some questionable inclusions. I figured that something fun for us to do would be to go through each starting lineup and single out the unworthy starters, explaining why they’re undeserving and who should replace them.

Let’s start with the AL.

C: Matt Wieters. Wieters has had only about 150 at bats this year and is out for the season due to injury. I can’t imagine how he’s considered an All Star. Filling in for him as a starter is Salvador Perez. Although he’s been good, how is he better than Derek Norris? Perez has 120 more at bats than Norris, but only has eight more runs (35-27) and two more homers (10-8). Norris leads 37-32 in RBIs and has big leads in average (.312-.282) and OBP (.416-.328). It’s really no contest on who’s been a better player per at bat, and Norris has huge leads in rate-based stats and isn’t behind in much in the cumulative stats. This, to me, is an egregious error.

1B: Miguel Cabrera. A solid choice as he’s clearly superior than Brandon Moss and Albert Pujols, two of the main contenders in the AL. The third best 1B in the AL is Jose Abreu, he of the 27 homers. Cabrera’s main competitor is Edwin Encarnacion. Encarnacion is equal to Cabrera in a few categories but has a huge advantage in home runs, 26 to 14. Cabrera makes up some of the difference with a big lead in average (.312-.277). Despite this, it’s pretty clear that Cabrera, at least this year, has not been as good as Encarnacion. He starts in place of him for three reasons:

1. Encarnacion is injured and, even if he was named the starter, he wouldn’t be able to play anyways.

2. Cabrera plays in a bigger baseball market than Encarnacion.

3. The biggest reason that Cabrera gets pushed above Encarnacion is because of his history of elite play. When in doubt, people always go with the established superstar over the newcomer.

2B: Robinson Cano. Cano is starting for the same big reason as Cabrera, because he’s been an All Star for the past few years, but he doesn’t have the same statistical dominance this year. Cabrera, while you could make a case that Encarnacion should be starting over him, at least has comparable stats to his. Cano hasn’t been anywhere close to as good as Jose Altuve, let alone Ian Kinsler and Brian Dozier.

SS: Derek Jeter. It’s the final year of his career, he’s the most popular player in the league, he plays in New York, and he’s one of the best players ever. That’s why he’s starting. Logically, though, he’s completely undeserving. He’s horrible defensively at shortstop, and the only reason why he stays there is to keep his streak alive of playing his entire career at one position. He’s okay offensively, but is nowhere near as good as Alexei Ramirez, Erick Aybar, or even Jose Reyes. The Captain deserves to start in the last All Star Game of his career, but it doesn’t mean that he got there by stats alone.

3B: Josh Donaldson. This is a pretty good pick. Donaldson was elite last year and is still above average this year. He hits for power, with 18 homers and 63 RBIs on the year. His average has slipped a bit to .247, but a lot of that is due to bad luck, as shown by his low BABIP. Another factor helping him out is the overall weakness of third baseman in the AL. There’s only Kyle Seager and Adrian Beltre that compare to him, but Donaldson is easily better all around than Seager and is better than Beltre, although by a slimmer margin than one might think.

OF: Jose Bautista, Mike Trout, Adam Jones. All are good choices. They’re all clearly a cut above the reserves, Michael Brantley, Yoenis Cespedes, and Alex Gordon, along with the rest of the outfield candidates in the AL. There’s not much to say about these picks.

DH: Nelson Cruz. Another good pick, although I’d have chosen Victor Martinez over him, due to his higher average and OBP with comparable numbers in cumulative stats.

Let’s move on to the NL.

C: Yadier Molina. He’s a perennial All Star, but there’s no world in which you could tell me that Molina has been better than Jonathan Lucroy this year, or at least actually be correct about it. Lucroy has been better than Molina in every single category this season. The real question is whether Lucroy or Devin Mesoraco starts. Mesoraco, with 130 less at bats than Lucroy, has outperformed Lucroy in most counting stats, especially in home runs, where Mesoraco has a 16-9 lead. However, Lucroy’s large lead in AVG and OBP along with his status as an established veteran gives him the edge over Mesoraco. Both should be starting over Molina, though.

1B: Paul Goldschmidt. This is a slam dunk pick. No one in the NL can compare to Goldschmidt’s all around superiority. Anthony Rizzo, Freddie Freeman, and Justin Morneau all have good stats, but, outside of Rizzo’s 20-16 advantage in homers, all are outclassed in every stat by Goldschmidt.

2B: Chase Utley. Second base is reasonably weak in the National League this year; that’s the only reason Utley’s starting. Assuming that Anthony Rendon is considered more of a third baseman, it all comes down to how much you value stolen bases. If you think that they’re an integral part of the game, you go with Dee Gordon. Otherwise, due to a lack of better candidates, Utley’s the starter.

SS: Troy Tulowitzki. There’s no other choice. He outshines every other NL shortstop considerably at every statistic.

3B: Aramis Ramirez. Neither Ramirez nor David Wright have been on par with their usual standards this year, but Ramirez somehow managed to get the job. Wright has probably been slightly better than Ramirez this year, but both have certainly not been deserving of an All Star spot, let alone being a starter. Both Todd Frazier and Anthony Rendon have been far better than Ramirez so the real question is whether Frazier or Rendon should be starting. They’re almost identical players, each with stats much alike to the other’s. In the end, I’d have to choose Rendon as the more valuable player between the two because of the additional value he creates by being able to play second base. However, one could easily make the case that positional flexibility has no place in All Star voting for a specific position, but I have to find an edge for one of the players somewhere, and that’s the best option I’ve got.

OF: Carlos Gomez, Andrew McCutchen, Yasiel Puig. One of these three players has to make room for Giancarlo Stanton, the question is: Which one? McCutchen is easily in, with his impressive stats filling up the box score. That leaves Gomez and Puig. Overall, Puig has been better than Gomez, with a far better AVG and OPS, giving us the final member of our outfielder trio. No matter what, Stanton has easily been the best outfielder in the NL this year and it’s a bad choice, no matter how you paint it.

Well, that about sums it up. All in all, the roster decisions weren’t all too bad, although some were blatantly wrong.

Unfortunately, oftentimes making fun of the roster selections is a lot more entertaining than actually watching the All Star Game. It’s too bad, especially as there could be some really good baseball played if all the best players in the league were motivated to do their best.

In World Cup news, Germany and Argentina are set to face each other in the World Cup Final. I actually may have built up some credibility with my predictions:

1. I correctly predicted 12 of the 14 knockout round matches to date (only missing Netherlands-Argentina and USA-Belgium)

2. I correctly predicted at the start of the tournament that Brazil would crack under the pressure in the semifinals and lose to Germany (although I didn’t expect the 7-1 smackdown that actually occurred)

3. I correctly predicted that Spain would not be part of the Final Four (although I didn’t predict that they’d lose in the Group Stage)

Of course, I also predicted that Uruguay would make it to the championship game, but let’s try and gloss over that a little, shall we?

I also predicted at the start of the tournament that Germany would win it all. Go me!

Anyways, it should be a great matchup between the team (Germany) and the player (Messi) and I can’t wait to watch it at 8AM on Monday morning during New Zealand time.

Go Germany!

The Knockout Rounds Preview

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That certainly was an exciting Group Stage. There were blowouts, shutouts, high scoring games, and low scoring games, and that was all in just Group G. Favorites crapped the bed (looking at you, Spain), underdogs pulled off surprising and unlikely victories (nice job, Nigeria, Greece, Costa Rica) and there was craziness throughout. Luis Suarez even got so hungry during a game that he had a bite of Italian food. Of course, that “Italian food” was really the shoulder of Italy’s Giorgio Chiellini, but still.

In my pool, I came in second, losing narrowly in a competition that went down to the wire. In the end, I ended up losing on that horrible play by Ivory Coast when they fouled someone on Greece INSIDE THE PENALTY BOX, DURING EXTRA TIME, DURING A TIE GAME, WHEN ALL THEY NEEDED TO ADVANCE WAS A TIE!!!!! I mean, how stupid can you get?!?!?! In case you hadn’t noticed, I may be a little bit bitter about that.

Anyways, I figured that, rather than rehashing my picks again, I’d preview each match in the knockout rounds, along with my picks for each game, all the way to the championship game.

Round of 16:

Brazil vs. Chile:

Chile plays a frenzied and energetic style that often leads to high scoring games, either because they score a bunch of goals, or give a bunch of them up. Their game against the Netherlands was huge because the loser had to play Brazil, the favorite to win the tournament, while the winner got to play Mexico, a much easier opponent. Chile lost, 2-0, so here they are.

Brazil didn’t look very sharp in its first two games, but really rounded into form against Cameroon, winning 4-1, showing that they deserved the pre-tournament status as the favorite.

As you know, I like South American teams a lot, but, since both teams are from South America, there’s no advantage for either team. Although I like Chile a lot, I think Brazil has more than enough to beat them.

THE PICK: Brazil

The Netherlands vs. Mexico:
Mexico is a pretty good team. They drew an easy group, and took advantage of it, beating Cameroon 1-0 (should have been 3-0), beating Croatia 3-1, and tying the tournament’s favorite, Brazil, 2-2. Outside of a shaky few months during qualifying, Mexico has been a pretty good team for a few years.

The Netherlands have been one of the surprise teams of the tournament. In the tough Group B with three very good teams, most people (including me) predicted that the Netherlands would be the odd team out. Instead, they won their group in resounding fashion with the maximum nine points. They were the first to show the world that Spain was no longer a very good team, winning 5-1, regressed slightly against Australia, winning 3-2, before easily beating Chile 2-0, to capture first place.

The Netherlands have Robin van Persie, ripped through a tough group, and have been playing very well. Mexico did well in an easy group, and have been playing very well for three games. Although it’ll be closer than expected, the Netherlands should beat Mexico with relative ease.

THE PICK: The Netherlands

Columbia vs. Uruguay

Uruguay beat England and Italy, two good teams, with Luis Suarez. Without him, they lost 3-1 to Costa Rica, a team that is generally not considered to be among the soccer powerhouses of the world. Luis Suarez makes a huge difference for this Uruguay team, and without him, they’re crippled. After the biting incident, FIFA banned Suarez for the next nine matches (and four months), meaning that he’s out for this game, along with the rest of the World Cup.

Columbia ripped through a creampuff group, with a combined score of the three games of 9-2. Because of their easy draw, no one is quite sure how good Columbia is. Uruguay was supposed to be that test, but it seems as though it’s not meant to be. If they advance and Brazil doesn’t get upset by Chile, Columbia should be able to test their mettle against the Brazilians.

With Suarez, Uruguay would be a trendy upset pick to defeat Columbia. Without him, they have next to no chance. Columbia should easily defeat Uruguay.

THE PICK: Columbia

Costa Rica vs. Greece

Greece only advanced because of a brain fart by the Ivory Coast. A Greek player was fouled inside the box in a tie game in extra time, needing a victory to advance. They scored on the penalty kick and advanced.

Costa Rica took advantage of the weakened Uruguay team when they didn’t have Suarez, barely beat Italy, and tied against England. Although they’re probably better than what they were originally assumed to be, they’re still not a great team. Of course, the lucked into an easy matchup, so they’ll continue to seem like a better team than they are.

In the most underwhelming matchup of the knockout rounds, Costa Rica should beat Greece, continuing its Cinderella run for at least another round.

THE PICK: Costa Rica

France vs. Nigeria

Nigeria is not a particularly good team. It was good enough to advance, but that’s largely due to being in an easy group alongside Iran, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Argentina, not because of their own talent.

France, after years of disappointing showings by their national team, destroyed Honduras and Switzerland, 3-0 and 5-2, respectively, before tying Ecuador 0-0 in a game that they didn’t care much about.

France has looked dominant so far and against a weak opponent in Nigeria, they should easily advance.

THE PICK: France

Argentina vs. Switzerland

Switzerland, despite being ranked in FIFA’s top eight, is not a great team. It escaped against Ecuador, was whipped by France, and easily dispatched Honduras. They’re not a bad team per se, but when compared to other teams in FIFA’s top eight, Switzerland is found sorely lacking.

Argentina didn’t play very well in the Group Stage, despite being in an easy group. They won all three games, coming away with the maximum nine points, but never really dominated, only winning each game by a single goal. Still, they have Lionel Messi, the best player in the world, and in the end, that’s really all that matters.

Switzerland will show why it shouldn’t be considered a top eight team worldwide, Messi will continue to be Messi, and Argentina should easily advance.

THE PICK: Argentina

Germany vs. Algeria

Algeria was considered to be the worst team in the tournament but somehow managed to advance because of their easy group. Outside of an explosion against South Korea in which they scored four goals, they have mostly looked like the team people thought they were at the start of the tournament.

Germany was my pre-tournament pick to win it all, and, on the whole, they’ve largely vindicated my prediction. They dominated Portugal (albeit a ten-man one), tied Ghana, and beat the United States.

In a game between one of the best teams in the tournament and one of the worst, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a huge blowout by four goals, but Germany should dominate Algeria with ease and move on to the quarterfinals.

THE PICK: Germany

Belgium vs. United States

The United States have looked very good so far. They beat Ghana, dominated Portugal for most of their game, and played Germany tough. With the rising interest in soccer throughout the United States, they’re going to have the whole country behind them.

Belgium, although it advanced with nine points, did not play well. They won 2-1 against Algeria before winning consecutive 1-0 games against Russia and South Korea. They should have dominated in an easy group, but did not do as well as they should have.

Call me a homer, but I haven’t made an upset pick yet, and I think the United States has a better chance than most underdogs to upset their opponent to advance to the quarterfinals.

THE PICK: United States

The Quarterfinals:

Brazil vs. Columbia

Columbia, although less heralded than Brazil, is a very good team. Unfortunately for them, Brazil is a superior team to them on a neutral pitch. When they’re playing in Brazil, in a stadium with thousands and thousands of Brazilian supporters cheering on their team, I can’t imagine that Columbia manages to overcome the overwhelming home field advantage of the Brazilians.

THE PICK: Brazil

The Netherlands vs. Costa Rica

Here’s where Costa Rica’s Cinderella journey comes to an end: against a superior team that isn’t weakened by injuries that has rolled through its competition so far. It would be a huge upset for Costa Rica to play on an even level against the Netherlands, let alone defeat them.

THE PICK: The Netherlands

France vs. Germany

France has looked like a great team during this World Cup. They’ve looked like they deserve to be in the first tier of favorites, alongside Germany, Argentina, and Brazil, after dominating . However, they have yet to play a team that’s half as good as Germany.

Germany, on the other hand, has played some tough teams in Group G, and despite advancing past Algeria in an easy win, has proved itself worthy of the title “co-favorite”. Their run won’t stop against France, and Germany should continue to advance.

THE PICK: Germany

Argentina vs. United States

The United States have played well so far. They beat Ghana, dominated Portugal before tying them, played Germany tough, and beat Belgium. Still, they have yet to see an individual player as dominant as Lionel Messi, nor a team as good as Argentina (I think that Germany is slightly worse than Argentina). Their run to the championship game should fall short in the quarterfinals against Argentina.

THE PICK: Argentina

The Semifinals:

Brazil vs. Germany

While Columbia is a very good team, it’s clearly not on the level of Brazil. Germany is a different story. Germany, while slightly inferior to Brazil, is an elite team. This is the game where I think that home field advantage will turn out to be a curse for the Brazilians. I talked about this more in The World Cup Preview (go read it), but I believed then and I believe now that both the social and political pressure on the Brazilian team will finally make the team collapse. I figured that the pressure wouldn’t matter against inferior opponents, but Germany is on Brazil’s level. I thought then that the team that beats Brazil would be Germany, in the semfinals, and I still believe that.

THE PICK: Germany

The Netherlands vs. Argentina

Argentina will make it to the semifinals because their quarter of the bracket is the weakest one, alongside the quarter that the Netherlands is in. Argentina is a team that needs Messi to be incredible every game and to be otherworldly against good teams.

On the other hand, the Netherlands has a multifaceted attack, speared by Arjen Robben and Robin van Persie. This attack dominated Group B, winning all three games with a couple of resounding victories. In this game, at least, the Netherlands has the advantage, and will likely be rewarded with a second consecutive trip to the World Cup Finals.

THE PICK: The Netherlands

The Third Place Game:

Argentina vs. Brazil

Both teams rely on an elite attacker (Messi and Neymar, respectively). Both teams are not as deep overall as some other teams. Both teams are South American. There are a lot of similarities between these two sides.

In this potential match, the most important factor is the reaction of Brazil (not the team, the country) to their loss to Germany in the semifinals. Do they support the team? Are they disappointed or angry, further exacerbating the cracks in the team’s foundation? That question will determine the results of this match.

In the end, I’ll have to lean towards Argentina. I think that the Brazilian fans will be devastated by the loss and will blame the team for the government’s lavish spending on hosting the World Cup. Of course, I could be completely wrong as I’m not exactly an expert on the reactions of South American fans to brutal losses to their national soccer team, but this is my column and my picks, so you’re just gonna have to roll with it. Okay? If you disagree or just want to lob insults at me, just head over to the comments section to voice those complaints.

THE PICK: Argentina

The Championship Game:

The Netherlands vs. Germany

The famed home field advantage of the South American teams won’t come into play in this scenario as both teams are from Europe. This scenario will result in the first time a European team wins a World Cup on South American soil.

Germany is deep throughout its roster, with players young and old melding seamlessly into an elite team, the best offensive team in the world, and a member of the Elite Three (no longer the Elite Four after Spain’s demise).

The Netherlands is a little more top heavy than Germany, but still has a relatively even roster. It’s got elite players in van Persie and Robben and was good enough to dominate in a Group of Death and to advance this far in my predictions. Still, I think that for the second straight World Cup, the Netherlands will fall short in the Finals.

THE PICK: Germany

No matter what happens, it’ll be great to watch the best teams in the world go head to head in the battle for supremacy and I, like the rest of the world, can’t wait to see it.

The 2014 NBA Draft Diary

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The most anticipated draft in many years is finally here. Andrew Wiggins, Joel Embiid, and Jabari Parker headline the draft. All three will almost certainly, barring injury, be perennial all-stars, although if Cleveland drafts Embiid, he’ll get hurt and be out of the league within three years.

It’s clear that God hates Cleveland. He only gave them the number one draft pick so they can screw it up and torture their fans even more.

After the top tier of Embiid (although he may have dropped out of it due to his injuries), Wiggins, and Parker, are Vonleh, Randle, Exum, Gordon and probably McDermott and Smart. It’s tough to narrow them down. There are so many good players up and down the draft that it almost doesn’t matter where you pick.

Evidence: after that second tier of five or six players and a third tier of eight or nine more, the next 35 players are all good players who can potentially be starters, if not more.

That’s why I love the Knicks-Mavericks trade for the Knicks so much. They unloaded Felton and the onerous contract of Chandler while getting the 34th and 51st picks. While that may not seem like that much, the 34th pick is essentially a first rounder except a lot cheaper, while the 51st pick is just as likely to result in a starter as any pick down to the 25th in this deep draft.

It’s nice to finally see a basketball team I cheer for (I’m a fan of both the Knicks and Nets) have a pick in the draft. It’s a feeling I’m not going have very much over the next few years.

I think it’s hilarious how the Nets are hosting the draft in Barclays Center while not having a single pick.

Anyways, my eleven year old sister is vaguely watching the draft with me, although she seems more likely to be preoccupied by the computer. If she ends up paying attention, she’ll probably focus on insulting the outrageous outfits of the draftees while I focus on insulting the picks. Still, it’ll be tough to do that. It’s so hard to insult picks when there are so many good players.

A big storyline I’ll be watching tonight is where Embiid goes. Who will take a huge risk by taking Embiid? It’s a massive reward if it pays off, but the GM that takes him will be betting their jobs on Embiid’s foot. That’s why I think that a team with multiple first round picks will take Embiid. Philadelphia probably won’t take him because they already have a center in Nerlens Noel. The only other team with multiple lottery picks is the Orlando Magic, who have the fourth and twelfth picks. That’s why, in my big prediction of the night, I predict that the Magic will take Embiid. It’ll be very surprising, but with the amount of risk involved, there’s no certainty. However, I think Orlando is the most likely to take Embiid, even if there’s only a 25% chance that they end up taking him.

Embiid’s injury has thrown this draft into flux. Originally, Embiid was supposed to go to the Cavs, the Bucks were going to get the hometown kid, Parker, and the Sixers would get who they tanked their season for, Wiggins. Then Orlando was going to take Dante Exum to put him in a dual guard role along with Victor Oladipo. Then the rest of the second tier would play out in some way to the next few teams and the next 35 picks could go in any random way.

Just a short explanation of a draft diary: a draft diary is pretty much just a running log of the draft. The time at which I wrote everything is recorded and, other than a small amount of editing, everything is the same as what I originally wrote.
7:26 Well, the draft diary is finally here! Hopefully it’ll become a tradition. I really like writing in this format.
7:27 I’ve been watching the pre-draft show for about twenty minutes and I’m already tired of that stupid NBA draft commercial that has the draftees taking selfies. It’s annoying, repetitive, and people are paying to see the players get drafted and play basketball, not look dumb and take selfies.
7:32 So does Cleveland take Embiid and run the risk of him being hurt? Do they go with Wiggins with the highest potential? Do they pick Parker, who can come in and help right away? No matter what they do, they’ll probably be wrong.
7:33 It’s telling how for years David Stern was booed on draft night, while Silver is cheered today. Stern was unpopular and overstayed his welcome, while Silver got rid of Donald Sterling, so it’s really no contest. Hopefully Silver can keep his popularity and continue to be an exceptional commissioner.
7:34 I like Silver’s speech about the Spurs and how the won a championship using players from up and down the draft, from Duncan at 1 all the way down to Manu at 57 and how he uses that to prove that great players can come from anywhere in the draft. That’s especially true today, when, as I said, there are so many good players throughout the draft.
7:39 The Cavs haven’t sent in their pick yet, despite their time running out. Maybe their strategy is just to not make a pick. They can’t be wrong if they don’t pick anyone.

7:41 The Cavaliers take….

7:41: ANDREW WIGGINS!

7:41 Parker just became one of the best players ever.

7:41 Wiggins just developed the beginnings for about five or six injuries that will prevent him from ever playing.

7:42 Sam Hinkie needs another eight boxes of tissues.

7:43 At least Wiggins is as close to a sure thing as you can get. Hopefully the Cavs won’t find a way to screw it up like they did with Anthony Bennett.

7:44 Wiggins’ suit is… interesting. It’s skeletal looking white flowers on a dark black suit. At least it doesn’t look like he’s bleeding like Jalen Rose’s draft day outfit did.

7:47 Milwaukee takes Jabari Parker, as expected. Not a big deal. It was what everyone expected, although it sucks for Philadelphia.

7:50 Jay Williams says “and now let’s go to his [Parker’s] father, Sonny”. I found that amusing. Just thought you should know.

7:51 It’s going to be very interesting what the Sixers do. Do they pick Embiid despite having another center or do they take Exum, Vonleh, Randle, McDermott, or someone else?

7:53 The Bucks have a sneaky good team. They have Larry Sanders, the Greek Freak, a couple of other decent players, and now Parker. As they have five good players, Milwaukee could easily be a playoff team next year in the garbage East.

7:53 WOW! The Sixers take Embiid! That’s crazy! They already have a center in Nerlens Noel, although I suppose they can have twin towers in the mold of Ralph Sampson and Hakeem Olajuwon on the late-80s Rockets or the late-90s Spurs with Tim Duncan and David Robinson.

7:56 Philadelphia also has a sneaky good team. They have Embiid, small forward X at number 10, Noel, and MCW. That’s a really good, young team, assuming that all four players pan out. In addition to those four, Hinkie has five second rounders, from whom he should be able to gain a starter or two, along with some good bench players. Lord, the Sixers are going to be stacked in a couple of years.

7:58 ESPN goes to a graphic comparing Embiid to Greg Oden. It’s amusing because Oden had his career derailed by injuries. Given that Embiid is a huge injury risk, I can’t imagine why would ESPN jinx him like that.

7:59 Orlando takes…

7:59 Aaron Gordon?!?!? That’s very surprising. It was widely assumed that Orlando would take Exum, but apparently not.

8:01 I’m not entirely sure why they’d take Gordon over Exum. Exum and Smart are the two best two point guards in the draft, with a drop off to Zach LaVine, Elfrid Payton, and Tyler Ennis. Smart probably won’t be around by Orlando’s second first round pick, at number twelve. The forward positions (where Gordon plays) are stacked in this draft, and they probably could have gotten someone comparable to Gordon at number twelve like Doug McDermott, Rodney Hood, or Adreian Payne.

8:02 The commercial with Dante Exum in it cracked me up for some reason. He’s got a noticeable Australian accent which is hugely incongruous to his physical appearance. Did I manage to avoid seeming racist? I hope so.

8:06 The Jazz take Exum 5th overall, doing exactly what I wanted the Magic to do. Utah will play him and Trey Burke in a dual guard role like Phoenix did with Eric Bledsoe and Goran Dragic before Bledsoe got hurt.

8:12 The Celtics take Marcus Smart.

8:12 I don’t like that pick at all. They already have a good point guard in Rajon Rondo, although they could trade him away for draft picks. They also risk pissing Rondo off, as Rondo is sensitive about those sorts of things. I think they should have taken Julius Randle for an elite rebounder and someone who gets a lot of second-chance points.

8:16 I think the Lakers will take Randle now. Randle doesn’t play the same position as Kobe and he’ll get a lot of rebounds and second-chance points to help make up for when Kobe messes up.

8:17 Julius Randle to the Lakers!
8:17 It’s always nice when I’m right, especially when it’s for the right reasons. For all the reasons I just listed, I love that pick. With his rebounding, point scoring, and his ability to help clean up Kobe’s mistakes, I think it’s a great pick.

8:19 Of course, I may be biased because I watched a lot of him during Kentucky’s run to the NCAA Championship Game, but still, he’s really good. I bet on Kentucky multiple times and I always was pleased with how he always seemed to get the big rebound or how he always managed to fight through contact for a tough layup.

8:22 The Kings take Nik Stauskas, an incredible shooter. He’s a very good player, the best shooter in the class, and is capable of creating his own shot. It’s nice that Sacramento didn’t take a power forward to crowd up their frontcourt even more than it already is.

8:23 Stauskas’ suit is… interesting.

8:29 In their first act as the Hornets, Charlotte takes Noah Vonleh. I don’t mind that pick. He is, presumably, a good player, but his team didn’t make March Madness, so the question is how good he actually is. He should match up well with Al Jefferson to form an imposing Charlotte frontcourt.

8:32 Wow his hands are massive. I think I could fit two or three of my hands into one of his.

8:36 Elfrid Payton is taken by the Sixers at number ten.

8:36 I love his hair.

8:37 Payton is a point guard, but Philly already has a point guard in MCW. What they really needed was a small forward and, conveniently, there were a number of good small forwards waiting for them, like Doug McDermott, Rodney Hood, or Adreian Payne. Also, the skill sets of MCW and Payton overlap a lot. Both can’t really shoot, which is not a good thing when one of them is going to have to be moved to shooting guard. I don’t particularly like this pick.

8:38 It seems as though Payton is having a little bit of trouble putting on his 76ers hat over his massive hair.

8:40 It’s amusing how MCW is interviewed and how he’s desperately trying not to say anything insulting or something that seems selfish. Drafts are always rich with unintentional comedy.

8:42 Doug McDermott to the Nuggets. I like the pick, although I’d like it for almost any team. He’s really good at shooting, scoring, dribbling, creating his own shot, making tough shots, being the leading scorer on a team, and being the only scoring threat on his team. Still, a lot of other Nuggets do a lot of the same things that McDermott does, making his skill set a little redundant.

8:45 Why does it sound like, during his interview, McDermott is breaking up with his dad? He said things like “after a four year grind” and “it’ll be great to move on”? That sounds a lot like a breakup talk to me.

8:51 The Magic take Dario Saric, a power forward out of Croatia.

8:52 He’ll be in Turkey for at least the next couple of years, so they’re essentially stashing him in Europe until 2016.

8:53 I’m not entirely sure how good Saric actually is because he’s from Europe and I’ve never seen him play, although I don’t like the pick for two reasons. One, he’s from Europe, and, despite success stories (see: Parker, Tony), there’ve been more busts, like Darko Milicic, especially among those picked high in the draft. Two, the last notable NBA draftee that I can remember who was stashed overseas and has been in the NBA long enough to establish his true value was Ricky Rubio. He was hyped when he was taken by Minnesota, but after spending a couple of years in Spain, he never turned into the elite point guard he was expected to become. That’s what I fear will happen to Saric.

8:56 The Timberwolves take Zach LaVine, somehow managing to forget that they’ve already got Ricky Rubio. Although the Cavs, Clips, and Knicks will never be approached at the summit of dysfunctional NBA teams, Minnesota is at the top of the next tier. Their pick is just about as bad as it can get in this draft.

8:56 LaVine is a great player and a physical freak, but he’s raw and won’t be ready for a couple of years, so he won’t help Minnesota convince Kevin Love to stay.

9:00 I like the Exum commercials, mostly because I love hearing him talk.

9:01 The Sixers traded Payton to the Magic for Saric and a 2017 first rounder. That makes a lot more sense. The Magic get the point guard they were expected to take, while the Sixers can stash a player overseas as a reinforcement for their team in a couple of years while picking up another first rounder. I like that trade a lot for Philadelphia and don’t mind it for Orlando.

9:03 TJ Warren goes to the Suns. He’s an elite scorer, carried North Carolina State, and doesn’t interfere with the chemistry between Dragic and Bledsoe at the guard spots.

9:05 Wow, Warren talks really fast.

9:10 The Hawks take Adreian Payne. It’s a fine pick but I don’t have much to say about it other than saying that a jump-shooting big is always useful in the NBA.

9:15 A really touching moment when Silver and the NBA ‘select’ Isaiah Austin after he was expected to be selected in the first round but couldn’t, after his basketball career was ended by a genetic disorder.

9:19 The Bulls take Jusuf Nurkic, a center from Bosnia and Herzegovina. That’s part of a trade with the Nuggets in which Chicago gets McDermott and Denver gets the 16th and 19th picks. I like the trade for both teams. The Bulls needed a scorer and a small forward and because they gain cap room by not having to pay another first rounder. The Nuggets get an additional two players and give up a player who they couldn’t use. Presumably that’s why they picked McDermott in the first place, in preparation for a trade. That’s also the reason why Philly took Payton at 10, Orlando took Saric at 12, and, now, Chicago’s pick of Nurkic at 16.

9:25 The Celtics take James Young, a shooting guard out of Kentucky. He’s a great shooter and player, but this creates a logjam in the backcourt for the Celtics with Young, Smart, and Rondo all competing for two spots. Presumably there’s a trade in the works for Boston in which they send away one of those three players.

9:32 The Suns take Tyler Ennis. That’s another strange pick. Phoenix, as I’ve already said multiple times, have Bledsoe and Dragic at the guard spots. As the Raptors really wanted Ennis two picks later, I can only assume that there’s a trade in the works between the two teams because this pick makes no sense whatsoever for the Suns. If the Raptors end up trading for Ennis, then that means that they’ve almost certainly given up on resigning Kyle Lowry.

9:33 Canada is dominating this draft with Wiggins, Stauskas, and Ennis all hailing from the Great White North.

9:35 The Bulls take Gary Harris for the Nuggets at 19. This pick makes Denver’s trade earlier today for Arron Afflalo redundant as both players are shooting guards.

9:38 If Toronto doesn’t manage to trade for Ennis, then they can take Shabazz Napier at twenty.

9:41 Miami is apparently trying to trade up for Napier, which would be a good move for them to pick up a replacement for Mario Chalmers. Of course, all their plans are based on the assumption that LeBron comes back. If he doesn’t, Miami will be screwed even more than they already would have been.

9:44 Well, this was the first pick of some random player than no one has ever heard of: Bruno Caboclo from Brazil, going to the Raptors at number twenty. He’s so raw that, despite his incredible physical gifts, he’s at least four years away from actually playing. Why are they not trying to build on their successful 2014 season by improving their team for the coming season? This pick makes no sense to me.

9:51 With their last asset remaining for the Harden Hijacking, the Thunder take Mitch McGary. I like that pick a lot. McGary is really good and he allows the Thunder to shift Ibaka to the 5 to replace Perkins while sliding in McGary at the 4.

9:58 Memphis takes Jordan Adams from UCLA. He was never projected to go this high, and I’ve not read much about him. At the very least he’s a 2-guard, a position at which the Grizzlies desperately need help.

10:00 Well, it’s time to stop watching as I’ve got work tomorrow and I need my beauty sleep. It’s also funny because in the NFL Draft Diary (the first thing I posted on this blog) I also got through just 22 picks. Still, getting through more than three thousand words together isn’t too shabby. Anyways, I hope you enjoyed and I can’t wait to see how all the new players fit into the league and who excels and who bombs, mostly so I can make fun of them. Now, the attention will shift off of the draft and onto the World Cup and LeBron’s (and the rest of the stars’) impending free agency.

World Cup Recap: Second Games

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With the USA-Portugal game bringing an exciting close to the second game for each team in the Group Stage, it’s time to look back and see how the picks are doing, as well as pointing out a couple of important storylines to watch that could be huge if the right dominoes fall.

Speaking of the USA-Portugal game… Damn it! That goal with thirty seconds left in extra time… How did the USA not hold them??? I’m writing this ten minutes after the game ended, and it hasn’t quite sunk in. Later on, in the Group G section, I’ll explain the ramifications of the tie.

By the way, if you haven’t already, check out https://sushionsports.wordpress.com/2014/06/13/the-world-cup-preview/ for the World Cup Preview and https://sushionsports.wordpress.com/2014/06/20/world-cup-recap-first-games/ for the recap of every team’s first game to ensure that you’re not totally lost as we head through this article.

Group A:

My Picks:

  1. Brazil
  2. Mexico
  3. Croatia
  4. Cameroon

Brazil 0-0 against Mexico

Croatia 4-0 over Cameroon

After their 0-0 tie, Mexico and Brazil are tied atop the group. This is a big problem. Remember the game that Mexico won, 1-0, against Cameroon? In that game, Mexico should have won 3-0 because of two bogus offsides calls that the referee screwed up. This would normally be fine except for one thing: goal differential. Let’s say Brazil beats Cameroon (very likely) and Mexico beats Croatia (probable). Let’s say that each team wins their game by one goal. In that scenario, Mexico and Brazil would be tied for first place, except that Brazil would win first place because they had a +3 goal differential after beating Croatia by two, tying Mexico, and, in this scenario, beating Cameroon by one. Mexico would have a +2 goal differential because they beat Cameroon by one, tied Brazil, and beat Croatia by one. This would result in Brazil winning the tiebreaker over Mexico and taking first place in Group A. There’s just one problem: if that referee hadn’t screwed up those two offsides calls, then Mexico would have a better goal differential than Brazil, would have, in a huge upset, won the group, and would have faced second place in Group B (the loser of Netherlands-Chile). There would be rioting on the streets of Mexico. Of course, this scenario may not end up happening, but if it did, FIFA would have a lot of explaining to do.

My picks are very likely to be perfect. It’s almost guaranteed that Brazil beats Cameroon, clinching Cameroon last place and giving Brazil the inside track to first place. Croatia needs to win and it moves into second place, while Mexico just needs to hold Croatia to a tie in order to keep second place in order to move on to the knockout rounds.

Group B:

My Picks:

  1. Spain
  2. Chile
  3. Netherlands
  4. Australia

Chile 2-0 over Spain

Netherlands 3-2 over Australia

Well, this group, one of the craziest groups in the World Cup so far (them or Group D), has lost almost all of its’ intrigue. The top two and bottom two spots are decided. Spain and Australia are both 0-2-0, tied for last place, each with zero points. The upcoming game between them is interesting because it’s a chance to see whether or not tiki-taka and the Spanish soccer dynasty are truly gone. It’s understandable that Spain may have gotten worse and moved down a level, and then, accordingly, got destroyed by two superior teams. However, if they lose to Australia, one of the worst teams in the tournament, then it’ll be clear that Spain is done. Those are the stakes for this match.

The other match, between Chile and the Netherlands, has more immediate importance. The winner of the game wins the group. If they tie, the Netherlands wins the group because of goal differential. Assuming that Brazil wins Group A, (as we talked about earlier) the loser of this match will have to go play Brazil, where they’ll be an overwhelming underdog against the best team in the tournament. The loser will get to play Mexico, or less likely, Croatia, a much easier task.

For my picks, it’s quite simple: Spain needs to beat Australia (because if they lose, Australia goes ahead of them, and if they tie, Australia wins on goal differential) to finish third, and the Netherlands cannot lose to Chile; otherwise, they take first place.

Group C:

My Picks:

  1. Colombia
  2. Ivory Coast
  3. Greece
  4. Japan

Colombia 2-1 over Ivory Coast

Greece 0-0 against Japan

Colombia has complete control of this group and will win it unless something crazy happens. For Columbia to come in second, they would have to lose to Japan, Ivory Coast would have to beat Greece, AND the four goal advantage that Columbia has over Ivory Coast would have to be erased. As I said, it’ll take something crazy and pretty much unprecedented for Ivory Coast to win the group. Greece tied Japan so they’re tied for last place with one point apiece. To finish third, Greece needs to win and have Japan tie or lose, or tie and have Japan lose. I suppose that they could also win by three (or one) while Japan wins by one, but that’s highly unlikely. Luckily, Greece is playing Ivory Coast while Japan is pitted against Colombia, so Greece is more likely to tie or win than Japan is. Of course, Colombia is almost guaranteed first place, so they may not be playing as hard as they could, while Ivory Coast will be doing its’ best to lock up a spot in the knockout rounds. This is too confusing. Let’s just continue with Group D.

Group D:

My Picks:

  1. Uruguay
  2. England
  3. Italy
  4. Costa Rica

Uruguay 2-1 over England

Costa Rica 1-0 over Italy

Well, this was a disaster. England flopped, Costa Rica decided to be really good, and Uruguay didn’t have Luis Suarez, only its’ best player, for their match against Costa Rica, which they lost. Costa Rica will almost certainly take first place, barring a historic meltdown. England cannot advance, although they could, potentially, make it to third place, which would at least give me a point. The winner of Uruguay-Italy moves into (almost certainly) second place and will head across the bracket to face (highly likely) Colombia. If Italy and Uruguay tie, Italy moves on, based on goal differential, as they lost to Costa Rica by just one goal, as opposed to Uruguay’s two goal defeat. For Uruguay, their game is a win and in. I’ll be cheering for them desperately. If they win, I salvage a point, Italy will likely move into third place, getting me another three points, and, on top of that, I picked Uruguay to be the runner-up, losing to Germany in the Finals so, although that almost certainly can’t happen anymore (because they’ll be on the same side of the bracket as Germany if they come in second place and Germany comes in first) but at least it’s not as bad as saying that your runner-up pick flamed out in the group stage. Anyways, this is making me sad. Let’s move on to Group E!

Group E:

My Picks:

  1. France
  2. Ecuador
  3. Switzerland
  4. Honduras

France 5-2 over Switzerland

Ecuador 2-1 over Honduras

These picks aren’t too bad. France is almost a lock to come in first. Honduras is almost a lock for last. The intrigue comes with the middle two teams. Switzerland is likely to advance because, although they’re currently tied in points, Switzerland gets to play Honduras, while Ecuador has to play France. Still, if France doesn’t play as hard as they could and Honduras rises to the occasion, then Ecuador could capture second place. Unfortunately for me, although it could happen, it’s not likely. Wow this is a dull group. I don’t have anything else to say. There’s really not much interesting to talk about over here. I suppose we should just talk about Messi and Argentina instead.

Group F:

My Picks:

  1. Argentina
  2. Bosnia and Herzegovina
  3. Nigeria
  4. Iran

Argentina 1-0 over Iran

Nigeria 1-0 over Bosnia and Herzegovina

Argentina has looked startlingly weak this World Cup. They haven’t looked like a member of the Elite Four that I mentioned in the World Cup Preview column. Then again, nor have Spain. Huh. This really has been a weird World Cup. Anyways, Argentina only beat Bosnia and Herzegovina by a goal, and it took a clutch goal by Lionel Messi a minute into stoppage time to escape Iran. They really have not looked sharp. At least they lucked into an easy group like Brazil did, so their flaws aren’t as evident. Of course, look at Spain. They got stuck with a tough group and got destroyed. Brazil and Argentina should be worried that that’ll happen to them too, except on an even bigger stage during the knockout rounds, with the whole world watching. The possible decline of Argentina is a huge factor to watch. Bosnia and Herzegovina (Can I call them B&H for shorthand? Wait… That’s either a camera store or a bagel place. Damn it! The world needs to come up with a good abbreviation for Bosnia and Herzegovina) are eliminated from the tournament after their loss to Nigeria, so I can’t get that pick perfect. It seems likely that Bosnia and Herzegovina and Nigeria will switch places so, at the very least, I’ll gain a point from each of them.

Group G:

My Picks:

  1. Germany
  2. USA
  3. Portugal
  4. Ghana

Germany 2-2 against Ghana

USA 2-2 against Portugal

Let’s start with the game less likely to get me angry: Germany-Ghana. Ghana managed to hold on and tie Germany, keeping them alive, barely. Now for Portugal-USA. Ugh. I watched the game, and watched with pure horror as the shot from Graham Zusi looked to be going wide. Then, as quick as could be, that horror turned to elation as I realized “Hey, wait a second… THAT’S A PASS” before the house erupted with roars of triumph. Of course, none of that compared to the feeling that we had been robbed after Ronaldo made a beautiful pass with thirty seconds left that resulted in a header, slipping past Howard for the deciding goal. Damn it! Anyways, the USA is still in good shape. If they tie or win their game against Germany, then they’re in. If they lose, then it gets trickier. If the United States loses to Germany, then they’ll need for either Portugal to win (as long as it’s not by four goals or more) or for there to be a tie. If Ghana wins, then it gets even trickier. If Ghana wins by more than one goal, they’re in and America is out. If they win 1-0, America is in. If they win 2-1, then the two teams draw lots to see who advances. If Ghana wins 3-2 or higher, then Ghana advances. Regardless, I’ll be cheering for Portugal and the USA, although I’ll try to keep it a secret that I’d actually prefer for there to be a tie or a Germany win. Of course, since Germany is so good, that shouldn’t be much of a problem. No matter how good the United States has looked, they still can’t play with the best teams in the world.

Group H:

My Picks:

  1. Belgium
  2. Russia
  3. South Korea
  4. Algeria

Belgium 1-0 over Russia

Algeria 4-2 over South Korea

Belgium is almost guaranteed to take first place. Other than them, this group is up for grabs. Algeria currently is in second place and has good goal differential, giving them an advantage over South Korea and Russia. If Algeria ties Russia, then they clinch second place. Belgium will still be playing hard to at least get a tie so they can stay in first and avoid (probably) Germany in their first game of the knockout rounds, so South Korea doesn’t have an advantage there. If Algeria loses to Russia and South Korea beats Belgium, then Algeria falls to last place with three points, while Russia and South Korea would be tied for second with four points. Russia has a one goal advantage against South Korea so South Korea would need to beat Belgium by one more goal than Russia beats Algeria by to win the tiebreaker by having scored more goals. Still, they would have to do it against the Belgians, Eden Hazard, Romelu Lukaku, and Thibaut Cortois, so it’s not particularly likely. Russia seems to have the inside track to the second place spot, while South Korea is likely to finish third. Here, at least, my picks seem to be in reasonably good shape.

Anyways, the upcoming games should be incredibly exciting. Each group has its’ two games playing at once so, at about the same time, each group will be decided. I am psyched, and it’ll be great to cheer on Team USA against Germany. U-S-A! U-S-A! Enjoy the games, everybody, and thanks for reading.

World Cup Recap: First Games

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With Russia-South Korea bringing an end to the first games for every team in the World Cup, I figured that it’d be a good thing to take a quick jaunt through the sixteen games played and to check up on my picks for each group (if you haven’t read about those yet, go read https://sushionsports.wordpress.com/2014/06/13/the-world-cup-preview/. The rules for this pool are outlined near the top of that article so for you to understand this one fully, it might be a good idea to go to that article.). And, another advantage of writing something like this is that it allows people who haven’t been following the World Cup so far to get into it. With that, let’s get started!

Group A:

My Picks:

  1. Brazil
  2. Mexico
  3. Croatia
  4. Cameroon

Brazil 3-1 over Croatia

Mexico 1-0 over Cameroon

Outside of an own goal by Marcelo, Brazil thoroughly dominated their game against Croatia, winning 3-1, while Mexico could have beaten Cameroon 3-0 if not for a couple of bogus offsides calls by the refs, instead beating them 1-0.

My picks are in very good shape. Cameroon looks to be the worst team in the group while Brazil is clearly the class of the group. It seems as though I chose correctly when I took Mexico over Croatia, as Mexico looked a lot better than Croatia did.

My picks seem to be very good. Of course, it’s not gonna stay that way for long.

Group B:

My picks:

  1. Spain
  2. Chile
  3. Netherlands
  4. Australia

Netherlands 5-1 over Spain

Chile 3-1 over Australia

Chile took care of business against Australia, winning 3-1, while the Netherlands utterly destroyed Spain, 5-1, in part due to the early frontrunner for goal of the tournament: Van Persie’s header.

My picks here… Not exactly so great. In a vacuum, I didn’t pick well. The Netherlands are likely going to win the group, with Chile in second, Spain in third, and Australia in fourth. That means I picked badly.

However, everyone picked Spain to be first. If Spain comes in third, then we all get zero points which doesn’t matter in a competition. However, everyone in the pool picked either Chile or the Netherlands to come in second. If the Netherlands comes in first and Chile comes in second, then I earn three points from getting Chile right, but the Netherlands completely wrong. If Chile wins the group and the Netherlands place second, then I get partial credit for each one, only netting me two points. In a nutshell, I’m a Netherlands fan from now until the end of the group stage.

Group C:

My picks:

  1. Colombia
  2. Ivory Coast
  3. Greece
  4. Japan

Colombia 3-0 over Greece

Ivory Coast 2-1 over Japan

Colombia easily beat Greece three-nil, while the Ivory Coast had a come from behind victory to defeat Japan 2-1.

My picks are doing quite well. Colombia showed that it’s easily the best team in this group while the Ivory Coast showed that it can defeat inferior teams but is inconsistent enough that a good team can beat them. The only part I’m not pleased with is the Greece in third, Japan in fourth picks. Japan showed that it isn’t a bad team and that it can play with some good teams, while Greece showed that they’re really bad after getting mashed by Colombia. Still, it’s not a huge problem as of now, because, assuming that Greece and Japan lose to both Colombia and Ivory Coast, their matchup will decide who gets third. Greece will probably need to either win or tie that game because their goal differential right now is -3, compared to Japan’s -1. At least I’m in good shape for now.

Group D:

My picks:

  1. Uruguay
  2. England
  3. Italy
  4. Costa Rica

Costa Rica 3-1 over Uruguay

Italy 2-1 over England

Costa Rica upset Uruguay, 3-1, although Uruguay didn’t have its’ best player, Luis Suarez, while Italy beat England 2-1 in an exciting and competitive game.

I’m not doing well at all with these picks. There’s a decent chance that I don’t get any points at all from this group. As Uruguay has a bad goal differential, it’s behind England in the standings. Its’ only hope for advancement is to run up the score on England in their next match while hoping that the game between Italy and Costa Rica isn’t a tie AND still having to win their game against Italy while hoping that the loser of Costa Rica-Italy either loses or ties, or tying against Italy while hoping that the loser of Costa Rica-Italy loses. Either way, I’m not in the best of shape. England needs the same scenario as played out above (with their opponents switched in for Uruguay’s, obviously) to advance as well.  Italy and Costa Rica each need a win in their last two games in order to clinch their ticket to the knockout rounds, depending on the goal differential.

Group E:

My picks:

  1. France
  2. Ecuador
  3. Switzerland
  4. Honduras

France 3-0 over Honduras

Switzerland 2-1 over Ecuador

France easily dispatched Honduras after a red card forced Honduras to play with ten players, while Switzerland and Ecuador were even throughout their game until a late goal by Switzerland in extra time gave them the victory.

Well, I’m, at least, in pretty good shape in this group. France looks like they’ll be able to run away with the group and Honduras pretty clearly looks like the clear favorite for last place, leaving Ecuador and Switzerland fighting for the group’s second spot in the knockout rounds. Ecuador is at a severe disadvantage in that race after losing to Switzerland. For it to vault past Switzerland, it’ll need to run up the score against Honduras, while hoping France beats Switzerland. Then, assuming that they have a better goal differential than the Swiss, Ecuador just needs to match whatever Switzerland does (i.e. win-win, tie-tie, loss-loss) in order to advance. If they don’t have a better goal differential, they’ll need to have a win to a Swiss tie or loss or a tie to a Swiss loss. If Switzerland manages to tie, or even beat, the French, then Ecuador will have almost no chance at advancing, although if Switzerland beat France, Ecuador would play France in their last game, meaning that they would just have to beat France in order to advance alongside Switzerland.

Group F:
My picks:

  1. Argentina
  2. Bosnia and Herzegovina
  3. Nigeria
  4. Iran

Argentina 2-1 over Bosnia and Herzegovina

Nigeria 0-0 against Iran

Argentina escaped against Bosnia and Herzegovina, winning 2-1, a close scrape for a team that is widely believed to be in championship contention, while Nigeria and Iran combined for a 0-0 tie, the first tie of the tournament, in the thirteenth game. Who says soccer is boring?

Everything is in good shape here. Argentina should run away with the group, Bosnia and Herzegovina (wow, that’s annoying to type) should beat up on the bottom two teams, while Nigeria and Iran will duke it out for third place. For me, all I need is for the top two teams to beat up on Nigeria a little less than Iran so Nigeria will have third place over Iran on the tiebreaker of goal differential.

Group G:

My picks:

  1. Germany
  2. America
  3. Portugal
  4. Ghana

Germany 4-0 over Portugal

America 2-1 over Ghana

Germany walked all over Portugal, winning 4-0, especially after Pepe received a red card, making the Portugese play with ten men. Thomas Müeller got a hat trick for Germany. America beat Ghana 2-1, in an exciting game in which Ghana dominated the flow of play for most of the game. America scored thirty seconds in before a stalemate for more than 80 minutes. Ghana scored to tie it up, but a couple of minutes later, the United States scored to take the lead 2-1 and to eventually win the game.

I’m in great shape in this group. Germany, especially with its’ huge goal differential after its’ 4-0 victory, is a huge favorite to capture the number one spot. America is likely to capture second place after their win and because Pepe’s red card which will keep him out of Portugal’s next game, against the Americans, making the United States more likely to win that game too. Portugal has a horrible goal differential and it’s at a severe disadvantage against the United States (because of Pepe’s absence) so it’ll need to beat Ghana in their third game to capture third place. Luckily for me, that’s a probable outcome as Portugal is a better team than Ghana.

Group H:

My picks:

  1. Belgium
  2. Russia
  3. South Korea
  4. Algeria

Belgium 2-1 over Algeria

Russia 1-1 against South Korea

Belgium dealt with Algeria, 2-1, while Russia let in an embarrassing goal to give South Korea a tie, 1-1.

My picks here are also doing quite well. Belgium has the lead by two points and are likely to take first place. Algeria has zero points and are at a disadvantage against South Korea in the race for third place because of South Korea’s tie with Russia. The gap between Russia and South Korea is smaller than it seemed before the tournament, but there’s still enough of a gap for it to be likely for Russia to take Group H’s second berth in the knockout rounds.

By the way, sorry for this being posted so late. I had finals and all the rest. Now that school’s over, hopefully I’ll have more time to write. Speaking of which, the next article out should be recapping the second game for each team. After that, there’s the NBA draft which I plan on writing a draft diary for. Then there’ll be an article recapping the third game for each team, then one previewing the knockout rounds, and then… who knows?

Anyways, there should be a bunch of great games on over the next few weeks and we’ll all be watching, alongside of the rest of the world.

 

 

The First Mailbag

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An article that I’ve always wanted to write is a mailbag, in which readers send in questions, comments, or insults, and in my column, I answer them. Of course, I wasn’t able to do that *cue dramatic music* UNTIL NOW!

I got a couple of questions from readers in the past few days, so I’ll answer them now. Here’s the first one:

So Mr Shshi, why don’t you comment on the possibility that teams that have runs of bad seasons have to reduce their ticket prices, at least for the cheapest tickets. Especially if the teams are getting public $$ as tax breaks. Thank you.

This is a good idea, albeit one that needs some alterations and one that has been advocated for before. Runs of bad seasons are OK. Taking a dump on your fans isn’t. The former is normal in the course of rebuilding. The latter is taking it too far.

Let’s tweak the idea a little bit to talk about just an individual season. A season is more than long enough to torture the fans. It shouldn’t be years before the league steps in to prevent a team from tormenting its fans.

Let’s swing through the four major leagues to see if this plan is reasonable and viable.

NFL- There are enough things that can go wrong in a season that, even when you’re trying to field a competitive team, you can get screwed by a big injury (think Peyton Manning with the Colts in 2011 when they went 2-14 or RGIII this past year when Washington went 3-13) or by your quarterback suddenly forgetting how to play football (think Matt Schaub with the Texans last year when they went 2-14). As this isn’t a team being purposefully bad, it’s them getting incredibly unlucky. It’s impossible to penalize a team for something outside of their control, so the idea won’t work with the NFL.

NHL- I don’t know as much about the NHL as the other three sports, but there’s a big problem with determining how bad a season is: the shootout point. How can you determine exactly how badly a team screwed over their team when they can earn points for losing?

MLB- MLB is a little more realistic for the idea offered up by the reader. The Astros have willfully destroyed their team over the last few seasons, opting instead to reload through the draft. While it hasn’t been pretty, they’re in good shape for 2015 and beyond with a number of good players on the way. However, in the process, the made their fans pay for horrible team after horrible team. That’s what the reader suggested teams have to pay for. However, other than them, only the Marlins (with the whole stadium and trading away star players fiasco) and Mets (says the depressed Mets fan) have really tormented their fans in the past few years, so there aren’t enough teams to make it a worthwhile proposition in MLB.

NBA- However, in the NBA, there are more than enough teams to make it a good rule change. By my count, seven teams willfully lost games at some point last year (Detroit, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Utah, Boston, Los Angeles, Orlando), one team was planning on losing games but when they won them instead, ended up deciding to go for it (Phoenix), and one team tried to win games but messed up to hilarious degrees (Milwaukee). That’s a lot of teams. Should the Sixers be charging full price for their tickets this year after a 26 game losing streak caused by ravaging their team? I can’t understand how that could possibly be okay to rip off your fans like that.

The problem is that sometimes, stuff happens (and it’s not stuff, but I try to keep it PG around here) and makes you lose games. Milwaukee did its best to win this year but still ended up losing the most games in the league. Should it be penalized for sucking but doing its’ best not to screw over its’ fans? I don’t know, but that’s why, to institute a plan like this, the NBA would need to make a “Don’t Screw Over Your Fans” Committee to decide whether or not a team deserves to be punished. The NBA has committees for almost everything else, so why not this too? Keeping fans interested and committed to their team seems like a worthy goal, and the only way to do that is to take money out of the owners’ pockets by making their ticket prices for the next year after their offense was committed lower. So, yes, dear reader, I think that that’s a great idea and one that the NBA should certainly consider implementing.

The second question I received in the past couple days was from someone who would prefer to remain anonymous, but who has asked me multiple times to write an article about fantasy baseball.  I hope this’ll suffice. Here’s what he said:

What techniques can I use to get a leg up on the competition in my fantasy baseball league?

Now, this is a good question. I’m currently in one fantasy baseball league and I use two methods for improving my team, one common, and one rare: streaming and stacking.

Streaming is often used but I’ll explain it here anyways just so we’re all on the same page. Streaming when one picks up a player (generally a pitcher) for a specific matchup, before dropping them the next day, in order to add another pitcher for another matchup. This allows one to accrue certain stats such as innings pitched, wins, and strikeouts, in order to more easily win your matchup.

The way I generally use streaming is by choosing one pitcher, every day, that I like. I then drop my worst pitcher (or a hitter if I have an extra one) and pick up the new pitcher. Still, I have an imaginary line that I use to help me decide who’s able to be dropped and who I should keep under all circumstances. As an example, you wouldn’t drop Clayton Kershaw to pick up Charlie Morton, would you?

When you have too many good pitchers, it becomes impossible to stream, which is why, in my league, I’ve been trying to trade away good pitchers to create an extra roster spot or two for streaming.

While streaming is almost always used for pitching, stacking is exclusively for hitting.

Stacking is when you have a bunch of hitters from the same team on your team. On my team, I’ve been stacking the Athletics. I have John Jaso, Derek Norris, Brandon Moss, and Josh Donaldson, and I’ve been trying to trade for Coco Crisp and Yoenis Cespedes.   

Why is stacking a good thing to use? Well, let’s say that John Jaso scores a run. Who’s likely to have knocked him in? One of Moss, Donaldson, or Norris! See, the idea behind stacking (which is an idea I came up with by myself) is that it magnifies each individual positive occurrence that happens to a team.

So far, it’s worked very well for me, and hopefully work for you too. The only pitfall is stacking a team like the Mets who are incapable of scoring more than three runs more than once a week. Aside from that, it’s great! Now I’ll be back in a few minutes. I just need to go mourn the Mets of my childhood. *sniffles*

Back! Anyways, so I have a lot more rules and techniques that I utilize to win at fantasy baseball, but a master has to keep his best secrets. Also, most of the people in the league with me are probably reading this, and I kinda want to make sure that I keep in advantage over them so I can win.

If you want to be in the next mailbag, email me at sushi.krox@gmail.com with a question. Make the subject line “SushiOnSports Question” and provide me with a name (or anonymous) and I may answer your question in the next mailbag. Hope you enjoyed!

 

Looking Backwards and Forwards with the Finals

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Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili, Tim Duncan

Wow. What a series. Not exactly exciting, per se, but it was amazing nonetheless. Just watching the well-oiled machine from San Antonio dominate in every way possible was stupendous to watch. Series like this one show that when Duncan, Parker, Manu, and Pop all finally retire, the Spurs will keep on rolling on as they always do.

So, if you recall, before the Finals (well actually it was during them, but whatever), I wrote a piece talking about what was at stake for each important player in these Finals (if you didn’t, check it out at https://sushionsports.wordpress.com/2014/06/09/what-these-finals-mean/). Well, now that the Finals are over, let’s take a look back and a look forward for what these Finals have meant. Let’s start with the Finals MVP.

Kawhi Leonard:

The Finals MVP, obviously, had a very good series. The question is whether or not this series shows that he can become the next Spurs superstar, following in the steps of George Gervin, David Robinson, and Tim Duncan.

He’s a good player, sure, but he’s not an elite scorer. He’s a very good defender, hassling LeBron all series, but does that make him fit to lead the Spurs into the future?

The accepted requirement for a superstar is to be an elite scorer and the crunch time guy for his team. Leonard doesn’t exactly fit those requirements. He’s not an elite scorer (although he’s capable of scoring more than twenty points a game) and he doesn’t have the ball in his hands at the ends of close games. However, I don’t think it matters all that much.

The Spurs ecosystem is such that all five players on the floor are supposed to pass up good shots for better ones and that anyone can score at any given moment, so the individual scoring numbers for Spurs are generally suppressed. Leonard doesn’t need to score 25 points a night for San Antonio to be considered a superstar, because that’s not what’s needed of him by his team. Along those same lines, as I said earlier, because the Spurs always look for the best shot no matter what, even in crunch time, Leonard can’t get every crunch time play run for him. Leonard can’t be a superstar by those traditional requirements because, again, that’s not what San Antonio asks him to do.

All Leonard needs to be able to do to be considered a superstar by the standards of the Spurs is to take over when it counts, like Tim Duncan. Duncan always knew (and knows) when, to win the game on any given night, that he needed to, let’s say, score twenty points and grab ten rebounds. This was an important quality of Duncan’s, as it allowed him to really turn it on in big games and to lead his team to victory.

As shown by these Finals, it’s pretty clear that Leonard knows how to take over in important games and that he has the capability to lead the Spurs into the future and to assume Duncan’s mantle as the face of the franchise.

Tim Duncan:

Duncan, already the best power forward ever, is now pushed up even higher up the list of the greatest players. By my estimate, he’s pushed past Bird (only won three titles, had a loaded team, didn’t last as long as he could have due to injuries) and Magic (was the second banana to Kareem for much of his career) and is even with Bill Russell for the third best player ever, behind Kareem and MJ. In fact, I think Duncan is better than Russell because while Russell won eleven titles in thirteen years to Duncan’s five, Russell played in a much weaker era with better teammates than Duncan.

There are a few notable similarities between Duncan and Russell: Duncan is a great teammate and is very unselfish. Russell was like that too. Duncan always shows up for big games. Again, just like Russell. Duncan even shares the same reticence and privacy that Russell had half a century ago.

Almost as important, Duncan now clearly asserts his dominance as the best post-Jordan superstar. The runners-up, in order, are LeBron, Kobe, Wade, and Shaq.

Shaq won four titles and was dominant whenever he wanted, but about a third of his career was while MJ was still around, so he’s technically not a true post-Jordan superstar. Also, he failed to become what he could have been had he tried and worked harder, so he was unable to get the maximum amount of points that he could have earned.

Wade won a title by himself, and won two titles and two runner-ups in the Finals in a subservient role to LeBron. As he only played at a high level for a few years before breaking down due to injuries, it’s tough to give him full credit.

Kobe won five titles but three were in a secondary role to Shaq’s. His teams also haven’t had success when he was the only star on his team and his team has won 45 or fewer games multiple times, so he loses points there.

If LeBron had won this year, he’d top this list, but even so, because of his runner-up finish this year, he still moves past Kobe to spot number two. He could have been even better and more dominant, but he never really stopped messing around and started really working on his game until after the 2011 Finals loss to Dallas. He’s accrued as many honors as you can get as an individual player and has had three runner-ups in the Finals and two championships, all as an alpha dog, so it’s impossible to put him lower than second on this list.

Duncan now has five championships, along with a resume so long that the Spanish-speaking announcers during the World Cup wouldn’t be able to say the whole list in just one breath. Those accolades are what make him the best post-Jordan player.

Another way that Duncan broke new ground is in adaptability. At the start of his career, Duncan and the Spurs relied on post-ups and slowing the game down. After the rule changes midway through the decade, they changed course to become a player and team that are essentially 3-and-D, along with great ball movement and selflessness. This transformation was impressive and it just adds to the legend of Tim Duncan. Whenever he decides to retire, the league will sorely miss him.

The Spurs Way (and International Players):

Speaking of adaptability and selflessness, the Spurs Way has proven its’ use throughout the series and the entire season. We’ve already discussed the stylistic and strategic changes that the Spurs have made, but let’s talk about a few other components of the Spurs Way.

  1. Only high character guys. They haven’t had a bad character guy since Stephen Jackson, way back in 2003. Since then, they haven’t risked any locker room cancers and instead have focused only on players that can contribute to a healthy locker room.
  2. Passing and unselfishness. All you need to know about the Spurs’ offense is that when announcers say that so-and-so made the “extra pass”, members of the Spurs just hear “the right pass”.
  3. International players. An astounding NINE of San Antonio’s players are not from the United States (compared to zero on Miami). There must be something about international players that the Spurs have discovered that makes them inherently… better, I suppose, (although I was thinking about “different, but in a good way”) that the Spurs now use to their advantage. Something that I find to be, perhaps, indicative of the gap between international and American-born players, is what happened in Game 1 of the Finals, the infamous Cramps Game. American players like LeBron were felled and couldn’t function properly, while players like Tony Parker and Tim Duncan were used to the brutal conditions. Parker said that it “felt like [I was in] Europe… We never have AC in Europe, so it didn’t bother me at all” while Duncan said that he hadn’t played in conditions like this since he “left the Islands” where he was born. Be it that international players are tougher, more skilled, or anything else, they, and the Spurs Way, brought the title back to San Antonio, a pretty powerful endorsement of them.

The Spurs Into the Future:

The Spurs are in good shape for the future. Of the San Antonio Big Three, Parker remains in his late prime, while Duncan and Ginobili, while clearly past their prime, remain good players and will be able to play for as long as they want. They have the future leader of the franchise, Leonard (as we talked about earlier), and a number of good players alongside him. They have around ten million dollars in cap space this summer and they can manufacture good players out of thin air. As long as R.C. Buford, Gregg Popovich, and Tim Duncan all help run the team in some capacity, the Spurs will be in good shape.

LeBron James:

How can you blame LeBron? Here’s a chart that showed the Heat’s EWA, or Estimated Wins Added by Heat players during the Finals (courtesy of ESPN Stats and Information:

Per DiemESPN Stats & Information

LeBron had nearly two, Bosh had about a half, and the rest of the Heat dragged LeBron down. The chart pretty much says that LeBron was dominant and incredible, Bosh was decent, and that the rest of the Heat were garbage, pulling LeBron down with them.

No matter how good LeBron might be, he can’t win one on five against the Spurs. LeBron was guarded by Kawhi Leonard, (who defended LeBron perfectly) but since the Spurs didn’t have to pay much attention to anyone on the floor other than Bosh, they could help onto LeBron to make it much harder for him to score. And, because there weren’t any scoring threats on the floor other than him, (apart from Bosh) he couldn’t rack up assists and get his teammates easy points when the Spurs helped off of them to guard him instead.

This wasn’t 2011 against the Mavericks all over again. In that series, LeBron forgot that he was LeBron and that he is unstoppable when he decides to be, and did nothing for minutes at a time, losing him a title and a lot of respect from the world. In these Finals, LeBron did everything that he possibly could. This time, LeBron didn’t lose the Finals; the Heat did.

And that’s really what these Finals should be about: Miami didn’t lose the Finals as much as San Antonio won them. Miami didn’t choke away a victory as much as San Antonio went out and got it. San Antonio outclassed Miami in every way, and rather than blaming LeBron for the shortcomings of his teammates or talking about how Miami sucks, we should all be applauding the Spurs for the marvelous tutorial on how to play the sport of basketball. That’s the story that people should take away from these Finals. It’s possible that we will never see the level of offense that the Spurs exhibited during this series ever again, so why squander it by blaming LeBron for something that isn’t is fault? Honestly, I think that we should all just take a moment and appreciate the rarity and history of what we were lucky enough to see.

The 2015 Heat:

Outside of three early termination options (from Bosh, LeBron and Wade) and a player option (from Udonis Haslem) (the difference between EWOs and POs is that the former is ending the deal a year early while the latter extends the deal an additional year), Miami only has just over four million dollars on their cap for 2014-2015 (from Birdman, Norris Cole, and Justin Hamilton). This gives them the freedom to improve. However, it may not be easy as that. Just to bring back their three stars, unless they take a massive pay cut, will be somewhere around 50-60 million dollars combined. Wade alone, when he picks up his player option, will be around a 20 million dollar cap hit. It’s almost impossible to be able to perform enough cap gymnastics to get around that.

Remember, this is a team that got solidly beat in the Finals. Just keeping their players (who are, keep in mind, all getting older) won’t be enough. They need to add a number of supporting pieces, but they don’t have the cap space to do it. Next year, even if they bring back LeBron and Bosh, they’ll be an older and shallower team, even weaker than they were this year. The Heat are in bad shape for the immediate future (or at least as bad as you can be when you just were the runner-up in the Finals) and it’s going to be interesting how they manage to deal with their bleak outlook for 2015 and beyond.

The Decision 2.0.:

How does this series affect LeBron’s decision? As we mentioned earlier, this series, it was LeBron (with some Bosh) against the Spurs. His teammates (again, excluding Bosh) were useless. Miami’s options to upgrade the team are almost nonexistent. Wade will accept his player options for the next two years because it’s a lot more money than he would get on the open market. Why would LeBron want to stay in Miami when he has to carry the team by himself, accept less money, and only be a championship contender because the Eastern Conference is complete garbage?

I’ve been advocating all along for LeBron to go to the Clippers (you can check out a few of my prior articles for the reasons why). An interesting direction that LeBron leaving Miami for the Clips might push the league towards is a league of superstars, rather than a league with individual teams. Instead of cheering for the Heat or the Thunder, fans will cheer for LeBron or KD, independent of the team they play for.

The NBA would never allow that to happen because it would push way too much power to the players, which could lead to an intriguing scenario: the players leaving the NBA and forming their own league, to officially take control of the basketball league away from the NBA. Here’s an article about that very concept from about two years ago, during the lockout: http://grantland.com/features/we-need-renegade-basketball-league/. It’s co-written by my favorite writer, Bill Simmons, and it’s certainly worth a read.

The ideas that the article proposes are fascinating and it wouldn’t be a stretch of the imagination to see this possibly happening. If the players took over and made it a players’ league, the NBA couldn’t do anything to stop them, the players would make more money with fewer restrictions, and we’d all get to finally stop seeing stars force their way to one team or another, because a star would own and run his own team. There’s no downside for anyone other than the owners of NBA teams, and if it ends up happening, that’d be one of the coolest things in the history of sports.

Speaking of cool things in sports, go turn on your TV and watch the World Cup. It’s been great so far and it’s worthwhile to watch. An article recapping the first slate of games for each team should be up, at the latest, within 24 hours, so if you haven’t watched the World Cup so far but want to get into it, you should check that out along with the last article I posted, previewing the World Cup.

Also, if you enjoyed this article, share the link to it on social media and with your friends and family, coworkers and acquaintances, and anyone else who you think might like it. Every page view, like, and share helps. Thanks in advance and thanks for reading!

The World Cup Preview

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Well, the biggest sporting event in the world is finally here after a long, four year wait. In my opinion, the World Cup is much like the Olympics, with the four year cycle, way too expensive stadiums, and worldwide attention, except that people actually want to watch the World Cup. I thought I’d write a short (warning: it’s really, really, really long) preview of the Cup, starting off with talking about the pool I started and created for the group stages of the tournament before getting to my picks for the aforementioned pool (you can post your picks in the comment section too!). Then we’ll talk about my picks for part of the knockout rounds and a few other things as well. Sound good? I can only assume you’re saying yes, as you’re reading this article and I can’t hear you through your computer screen, no matter how loudly you scream.

So here’s how the pool works. It’s quite simple:

For the group stages: Pick the order of the teams’ finish. For example in Group G, you might choose

1. Germany

2. Portugal

3. America

4. Ghana

For each pick exactly right, three points are earned, and for each pick that’s missed by one point, one point is earned. Outside of that, no points can be earned.

So that’s the pool. My picks later on in the article reflect the parameters put in place.

Now, when I make picks for a pool, I’m serious about doing so. I research, I use online tools, and I watch games. For the picks below, the ones I’m using for my pool, you’ll find my an explanation combining both my reasoning and a very useful online tool from FiveThirtyEight.

For March Madness, FiveThirtyEight made an online, interactive bracket using data and fancy stats, to create winning probabilities for every team in every game.

They used the same principles for the World Cup. Here’s the link to their interactive forecasting model: http://fivethirtyeight.com/interactives/world-cup/. For most teams, I agreed with their assessments. For teams that I didn’t know so much about, I followed their opinion. In a couple of rare cases, I went with my gut, against their predictions, including once that was caused by patriotism. ‘Murica!

Group A:

  1. Brazil
  2. Mexico
  3. Croatia
  4. Cameroon

Brazil is going to advance with ease. They’re at home and lucked into one of the easiest groups. They’re from South America, (which is important to me, as we’ll get to later) home field advantage matters a lot in the World Cup, and they have a very good team. In fact they’re good enough to be in the Elite Four (you’ll see that mentioned a few times throughout the article and I’ll explain later on, closer to the end of it). I suspect that the pressure of a riotous, soccer-crazed nation will get to them, but with this creampuff of a group, I doubt it will affect them in the group stage.

Mexico and Croatia are essentially a tossup for the second spot according to FiveThirtyEight. I picked Mexico as, outside of the recent stretch in which they were so bad that they barely made it into the World Cup, have been very good for years. Also, I suppose, if Mexico advances, then Americans can say “Well, we beat Mexico, so if we weren’t in the Group of Death, (which they really aren’t, as we’ll get to later) then we would have advanced too!” What can I say? I’m just a patriotic American.

Cameroon is clearly a cut below the rest of the group, although, as the gap between them and the Croatia-Mexico level isn’t a chasm, so if a couple of goals and 50-50 calls go their way, they can certainly advance as well.

And yes, I am aware that the Croatia and Brazil have played (Brazil beat Croatia 3-1) but I wrote this long before the game started, so my predictions are untainted by any future knowledge.

Group B:

  1. Spain
  2. Chile
  3. Netherlands
  4. Australia

This is the real Group of Death. Spain is the defending World Cup champions from when they won in 2010. That win is sandwiched between two victories in. the Euro Cup in 2008 and 2012. While their core is getting older, they still have enough left in the tank to remain in the Elite Four and to take this group with relative ease.

Chile is a very good team. In 2010, they were in Spain’s group and advanced to the quarterfinals where they were summarily dismissed by Brazil, 3-0. I’ve always been rather bullish on South American teams, AND in this World Cup, they’re playing close to home, giving them an advantage (although I’m not sure how big that advantage is). FiveThirtyEight’s model also sees them as a lot better than the Netherlands, and even gives them a decent shot to upset Spain to win the group.

The Netherlands were the runner-up in the 2010 World Cup, losing to Spain, 1-0. They’re also getting old, but they haven’t handled it quite as well as Spain has. Robin van Persie is still a beast, although he’s been hindered by injuries as this past year as he scored just twelve goals in 21 games, playing for Manchester United in the Premier League. Between van Persie’s injuries, the growing age of the team, and the tough group, it’s hard to believe in the Netherlands. Of the top three teams in this group, one has to be the odd one out, and I’m betting that it’s going to be the Netherlands.

Australia. Poor Australia. Not a very good team to begin with, they get stuck with three other title contenders? Kinda sucks for them. I’d wouldn’t be surprised if they failed to notch any goals, let alone any points. Well, the consolation for Australia is that at least they’re there at the World Cup. For them, it’s triumph just to have made it. Anything else they accomplish is just gravy.

Group C:

  1. Colombia
  2. Ivory Coast
  3. Greece
  4. Japan

This group one of the most balanced groups, although Colombia is clearly the class of it. It would be a major upset if they failed to make it out of the group stage.

The intrigue comes with the next three teams, the Ivory Coast, Greece, and Japan. The Ivory Coast has historically disappointed in big tournaments, but I think that this year is going to be the year they finally advance, due mostly to their relatively easy draw.

Speaking of draws, it’s impossible to overstate the foolishness of FIFA in continuing with their antiquated method of determining groups. Their methods may seem fine on the surface, but what method would have such disparities between groups as the one between Group A and Group B? Let’s say that Brazil and Spain are equal (which they are normally, although since the World Cup is in Brazil, Brazil has a big home field advantage). Which one is more likely to make it to the knockout rounds: the team with two okay teams and a bad team (all relative to teams in the World Cup) or the team with one very good team, one good team, and one bad team? It’s no contest. It penalizes teams for nothing other than dumb luck! How is that in the spirit of competitive balance and exciting games?
On the flip side, you have the Ivory Coast, which is likely to advance out of the group stage merely because of the group it was handed by FIFA. Then, when they advance, we get to watch them get blown out of the water by the first place team of Group D (which is close to a tossup). Not exactly an exciting game. For the good, of all, FIFA should finally get rid of its’ useless method for determining groups.

A good article that really hashes this out and explains it in detail, along with offering solutions is at http://grantland.com/the-triangle/group-of-fairness-how-the-world-cup-would-look-with-straight-seeding/. Grantland overall is great—I really enjoy it—and it might be worth checking out.

Wow, that was a long tangent. Getting back to business, I don’t know much about Greece or Japan, but the projection model favors Greece by a decent sized margin so I’m going to roll with it.

Oh, and another tangent, this time about the roll part of the sentence: I was once playing pickup basketball with some friends and I set a pick. The other guy says “Sushi, roll!” leading to us having to pause the game so we could all laugh for a bit. It’s great having an awesome name like Sushi.

Anyways, I seem to be always going off topic in my old age, so before I can run off on another tangent, on to Group D!

Group D:

  1. Uruguay
  2. England
  3. Italy
  4. Costa Rica

This is also clearly a Group of Death. You’ve got Uruguay, a team that I’m very bullish on, England, a team that’s rebuilding but still has very good players, Italy, a team who is also pretty good, and Costa Rica, a team that hasn’t been too bad and which solidly beat America, 3-1, only a few months ago.

I picked Uruguay to win the group because, as you know, I like the South American teams. In addition, they’re playing close to home, and they have Luis Suarez. For those of you who don’t pay attention to the Premier League, Suarez scored 31 goals for Liverpool this season, a staggering amount. That’s more than enough for me to take Uruguay.

I have England and Italy in the same tier for this group, the fighting-for-second-place tier, and was leaning towards Italy (because, after all, England is rebuilding) but FiveThirtyEight’s model thought England was almost as good as Uruguay in terms of likelihood to advance and to win the group, so I chose England to advance alongside Uruguay.

Costa Rica, in my opinion, not a bad team in and of itself, got screwed over by the selection process, and, while they may have even advanced in an easier group, will likely find themselves in last place due to the luck of the draw.

Group E:

  1. France
  2. Ecuador
  3. Switzerland
  4. Honduras

While France’s individual players are very good, their results have been highly inconsistent on the national team level. In a weak group, I’m hoping that their talent outweighs their history and that they place first in their group and advance to the knockout rounds. The projection system agrees with me, pegging France’s odds of advancing at just over 80% and their odds of capturing the top spot at nearly 54%.

I chose Ecuador for four reasons: one, the model believes them to be better than Switzerland, two, they’re South American, three, they’re playing close to home, and finally four, because of their easy draw. That’s enough for me.

Switzerland is third. I don’t exactly have a reasoned opinion about it, I just don’t like their chances. I like their chocolate, I like their cheese, I just don’t like their soccer team. So sue me.

Honduras comes in last place. While I’ve already outlined why I chose Ecuador and France to advance, I figured that there was probably a reason that FIFA put Switzerland in the top eight of the world (other than FIFA being based in Switzerland, bribes, or that FIFA isn’t exactly the sharpest knife in the drawer. That pun was unintentional, I didn’t mean to call attention to the fact that they’re bad at the World Cup drawing. Oh wait I just did! Wow, I’m really on a bad crappy joke run, I’d better stop now) so I ended up choosing them over Honduras.

Group F:

  1. Argentina
  2. Bosnia and Herzegovina
  3. Nigeria
  4. Iran

I picked Argentina to take the group for a bunch of reasons. I won’t rehash all of the reasons related to Argentina being located in South America, as you’ve probably memorized it by now and I’d bet that you’re a little sick of it. In addition to those aforementioned reasons, Argentina is in the Elite Four and they have Lionel Messi. I like Messi because he’s a beast, has beautiful passes, (while also scoring plenty of goals) and because, as he’s only 5’’4, he brings hope to smallish people like me.

Departing from the usual order of teams, I’ll talk about the second-place pick last. Why? I’m simply a daredevil, living life on the wild side.

Iran is a tough team to predict. They haven’t played much against international competition so it’s challenging to determine exactly how good they are. Still, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that Iran isn’t a good team, and place them firmly in last place.

Nigeria also isn’t a great team. I’m bearish on African teams, partly because they’ve historically not done well in the World Cup, partly because of their lack of competition against elite teams. However, when in doubt, as always, let’s go check out the projection system. The model gives them a 68% chance of failing to advance and sees them to be worse than Bosnia and Herzegovina, so I’m going to trust the math and put Nigeria third.

Finally, we’ve got Bosnia and Herzegovina. They’re a solid team, by all accounts, and as there are two teams clearly a cut below them, they fall into the second spot, almost by default.

Group G:

  1. Germany
  2. America
  3. Portugal
  4. Ghana

Germany, the last member of the Elite Four, (yes, we’ll get to what that is soon) and is a very, very good team. It has exceptional players such as Mesut Özil, Thomas Müller, and Phillip Lahm, their captain. There’s no South American team to upset them. They’re clearly a cut above the rest of they’re group and it’d be extremely surprising if someone other than them took first place in the group.

“Why in the world would you pick America?” you might ask. My answer might be that I’m a red blooded American, who likes guns, gets fat, and expects the government to pay for my problems. Whenever my Yanks take part in a competition, my patriotic pride swells up, and I have to believe in them.

Well, to be honest, none of that is actually true. The real reason why I’m picking America is because of their schedule. America plays Ghana first, and is likely to beat them according to FiveThirtyEight. If they can tie or beat Portugal in their second game, something the projection system gives a 58% chance of happening, then they’ll be in good shape heading into their third match, with Germany.

See, America can’t play with Germany—they’ll just be overwhelmed. America’s only chance is to hope that Germany beats Ghana and Portugal and rests most of their starters and plays its second team instead. If that happens, America would have a decent shot at winning or tying (although, even against Germany’s second team, there’s still a decent chance they might lose), which would push them ahead of Portugal and into the second spot. Of course, this might not play out the way I hope it will, but at the very least I can dream a little, for at least a few days.

Portugal is next. They’re a good team, but a more accurate team name might be “Cristiano Ronaldo and ten other guys”. Ronaldo is an amazing player so I couldn’t put his team any lower than third in this group, but if an opposing team can shut Ronaldo down, Portugal will be in deep trouble.

Ghana, as we all know, has eliminated America in the last two World Cups. Still, I think this’ll be the year that we finally get rid of Ghana for a couple of reasons: one, America has gotten better over the past four years while Ghana has stagnated, and two, Ghana’s in Africa which, as we talked about earlier in the Nigeria section, is generally a no-go for me. In a group with three superior teams, Ghana seems destined to finish last.

Group H:

  1. Belgium
  2. Russia
  3. South Korea
  4. Algeria

Belgium has a few good players, including Thibaut Cortois, the keeper who led Atletico Madrid to a second place finish in the Champions League, Eden Hazard, and Romelu Lukaku. In a weak group, their good players should push them to a first place finish in their group.

The projection model sees Russia as the likely second place finisher, although they have a decent shot to vault past Belgium and into firs placet.

Of the two other teams, South Korea and Algeria, South Korea has about a 40% chance of pulling an upset and advancing to the knockout rounds, while Algeria has about a 20% chance of doing so, deciding the last two spots in this group.

Wow, that was certainly a long-winded explanation and analysis. Now, we’ll move onto a couple of storylines to watch throughout the World Cup.

The Top Heavy Tournament:

Throughout the article, you may have noticed that I’ve referred a few times to the “Elite Four”. You may have wondered what that referred to. Well, now, you’re about to find out! *cue game show music and people happily screaming* When deciding on predictions for tournaments, drafts, and everything else, it’s useful to separate teams and players into different tiers to make it easier to choose between them. In this World Cup, the highest tier consists of Brazil, Germany, Spain, and Argentina. The next tier is just Uruguay, and there are a number of teams in the third tier. Still, as you can see, this years’ tournament is very top heavy. There’s a chasm between the Elite Four and the third tier. Because there’s very little parity, this tournament will not be conducive to Cinderella runs by any third or fourth tier teams. It’s too bad for fans of specific teams, but it’s incredible for fans of soccer. Why? The Elite Four are very likely to meet in the semifinals, meaning that those matches should be competitive and the best soccer in the world. It should be great.

The Many Groups of Death:

It’s annoying how often the term “Group of Death” is used, but even worse are the confusing qualifications to be one. Can there be multiple Groups of Death? Is it just the hardest group? The best team in the group or the teams in the group’s average level? There are so many befuddling and vague requirements to be a Group of Death to make sense of. If you think you have an answer to any of the questions, let us all know in the comments section.

America and Saving Face in the Group of Death:

Speaking of Groups of Death, Group G has been hyped up by the American media to be considered one of said Groups of Death. The question, of course, is why. While America seems to have a harder group than most, it certainly isn’t as hard as Group B (which is why we need clear rules for being a Group of Death like I outlined in the last paragraph). I think that the reason why the American media has decided that America is in the Group of Death is to lower expectations for the team.

To explain, here’s an example of that in every day life. Sometimes, a job of mine at home is to unload the dishwasher. Let’s say I dutifully unload the dishwasher every time that it needs to be done for a month. If I continued doing it, no one would notice it or thank me for it because it’s become expected of me.

Now let’s say that I rarely unloaded the dishwasher. If I unload the dishwasher, since the expectations for me were so low, I’d be praised and what I had done would be appreciated more.

Now apply that to what the media has been doing. They’re setting America up so that if they fail, it’s okay because it’s because they were stuck with in a Group of Death, and if they advance, they’ve exceeded expectations and are worthy of much praise. That’s a lot better than the situation that Brazil has been stuck with.

Pressure on Brazil:

Speaking of Brazil, they have a couple of inherent advantages in this World Cup, outside of the variables that are able to control. One, they have an easy group, as we discussed a while ago. Two, they’re playing at home, which has historically been a boon for whoever gets to host the tournament. Still,  I suspect that home field advantage might prove to be a curse in this year’s World Cup.

Think of the political situation in Brazil: people are rioting in the streets, upset that their government is spending money on a tournament when that money could be used to help get better schools, better housing, and more food. Think of the social situation in Brazil: a soccer-crazed nation is hosting the World Cup and which has a team that’s considered the favorite to win. That’s a lot of pressure on a team. The pressure won’t matter in Group A when they’re playing against inferior competition. The pressure will grow steadily until they finally face a team their equal. If they fall behind against a team as good as them, I suspect that the pressure will get to them and they will lose. That’s why I don’t have them winning the World Cup, although we’ll get to that in greater detail once we reach the knockout rounds.

I’m saving my picks for the knockout rounds until we actually know who’s participating, although I’ll be sure to let you know my picks once the bracket is locked. Right now, my final four teams are Germany, Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay (upsetting Spain in the quarterfinals) with the pressure finally getting to Brazil in the semifinals and Uruguay pulling of another big upset of an Elite Four team, this time Argentina, resulting in a Germany-Uruguay Finals, which I pick Germany to win.

I’m looking to possibly do a pool for the knockout rounds, so if you’re interested, send me an email at sushi.krox@gmail.com or just post in the comments section. If enough people answer, we can have a SushiOnSports pool, which I’ll be sure to write about.

Quick alert about the NBA Finals: the Spurs’ offense has been incredible, and after blowing out Miami last night, 107-86, they look like a lock to win the championship. I’m saving my extended thoughts for another time, probably in a new article after the series is over.

Anyways, enjoy the World Cup action! It should be great!