FOR THEY WERE JOLLY GOOD FELLOWS

 The recent ugly loss to the Memphis Griz, lacking their star players, is now being hailed as The Demise of the Dub's Decade. One might have said the same thing the season after the '22 Warrior NBA Championship. Do Not Weep for the Dubs, Argentina! The Warriors have won Four (Count them, 4) NBA Championships since 2015. The Warriors' owners and fans were treated to a lot of great hoops. A new arena was built in San Francisco, bringing the team back to its roots, while remaining Golden. 

As we look at the team right now, things appear pretty grim. It seems that we will have to leave The Dubs to their place in history and begin the process of building a new history. Allow me to humbly suggest that they not panic and start forcing trades before the February deadline. The way some of the tradeable guys are playing, they will never bring back the value the Warriors need to become a contender again. Right now, the Warriors need to start playing DEFENSE. They need to STOP MAKING TURNOVERS and they need to STOP TEAMS FROM GETIING SECOND SHOTS. These are not impossible goals, given that the season is not quite half over. If they accomplish these goals, the offense will flow as it flows historically and organically following energy and toughness. 

Whatever happens by the end of the season will be the responsibility of the players and coaches, but at the end of the season, the Warriors must bite the bullet. Owners and GM must REBUILD. They have some young players that can become the nucleus for a new generation of Dubs. But they must be willing to let go of the past. I will always remember my old coach, Alex Hannum telling me: "Tom, you know I love your game, but I would trade you in a second if I thought it would make the team better." If I sign off my blog with this quote, call it cowardice because the Warriors MUST be willing to trade EVERY SINGLE PLAYER on the team in order to make the transition work for the future of the franchise. That's going to mean withstanding the slings and arrows and an arena of BOOING as the transition takes place. It will mean saying a fond farewell to iconic Warriors' faces. Do not weep for them, Warriors' fans. Their banners will hang in the rafters for you to see and remember with gratitude and joy for four (Count them, 4) NBA Championships in eight years and 7 (Count them, 7) Western Conference Championships.

I just sent this poem by Richard Hugo to Ron Adams, an assistant coach of the Warriors. He's in the poem and he approves this message.

MISSOULA SOFTBALL TOURNAMENT    Richard Hugo

This summer, most friends out of town
And no wind playing flash and dazzle
In the cottonwoods, music of the Clark Fork stale,
I’ve gone back to the old ways of defeat,
The softball field, familiar dust and thud,
pitchr winging dips and rises, and wives,
The beautifuful wies in the stand, basic, used,
Screeching runners home, infants unattended
In the dirt. A long triple sails into right center,
Two men on. Shouts from dugout, go, Ron, go.
Life is better run from. Distance to the fence,
Both foul lines and dead center, is displayed.
 
I try to steal the tricky manager’s signs.
Is hit and run the pulling of the ear?
The ump gives pichers too much low inside.
Injustce? Fraud? Ancient problems focus
In the heat. Bad hop on routine grounder.
Close play missed by the team you want to win.
Players from first game, high on beer,
Ride players in the field. Their laughter
Falls short of the wall. Under lights, the moths
Are momentary stars, and wives, the beautiful wives,
In the stands now take the interest they once feigned,
Oh, long ago, their marriage just begun, years
Of helping husbands feel important just begun,
The srimping, the anger brought home evenings
From degrading jobs. This poem goes out to them.
Is steal-of-home the touching of he heart?

Last pich. A soft fly. A can of corn
The players say. Routine, like morning,
Like the week. They shake hands on the mound,
Nice grab on that shot to left. Good game, Good game.
Dust rotates in their headlight beams.
The wives, the beautiful wives are with their men.
 

DREADING BLOGGING ABOUT DRAYMOND

 It was at the Warriors' Parade following their first NBA Championship in 2015, at a gathering of players and fans, that I told Draymond Green how much I appreciated his game, that what he was doing for the team, the D, the hustle points, the boards, the passing, reminded me of what I was asked to do for the Warriors when I played in the Sixties. Draymond's super-star was and still is Steph Curry; mine was Rick Barry. We deferred to them. We found other ways to help the team. 

Draymond's reaction to my praise was polite. He might have known who I was, but then again. . . My jersey hangs in the rafters of Chase Center. The Warriors are home to me in The City--where I grew up. In retirement I've become a fan. These Dubs have made my old age sparkle. I identifed with Draymond. I did, even when he foolishly fell for Lebron's disrespectful walk-over and struck Lebron in the cajónes. That spontaneous move cost the Warriors the Championship and the historical achievement of four NBA Championships in a row. 

I cut Draymond slack for that because as a young player I might very well have done the same thing. Since then, I have cut Draymond Green a lot of slack for his emotional outbursts, tech fouls and suspensions because, yes, Meschery might have done the same thing. I led the league a couple of times in personal fouls and got into a number of on-court brawls. I even tried punching Wilt Chamberlain once, much to the humor of the fans watching at my flailing attempts that never quite reached Wilt's jaw. 

Basketball was a different game back then. Fights or thrown elbows, or close-line takedowns on drives were often overlooked. Suck it up, get back in the game, or put up your fists and get it on. The fines were miniscule. Worth every penny if I landed a good one on Clyde Lovelette. Today, the way players fly through the air, the NBA is absolutely right enforcing flagrant fouls, with huge fines and suspensions. Players dropping from such heights could die. 

I use the examples of the "old days" because Coach Kerr alluded to them, comparing Draymond's actions on the court in the early stages of his career to no more than what went on for most of the pre-21st century NBA. I get it, and I suspect any NBA coach who played or coached back then understands what Steve Kerr was talking about. In those days, before the league suspended a player, a terrible foul had to be committed.. I'm thinking of the punch suffered by Rudy Tomjanovich that shattered his face. 

For the league, and particularly Joe Dumars (A member of the most notorious PISTONS' "Bad Boys") to state that the accumulations of bad behavior is at the root of Draymond's recent suspensions is HYPOCRITICAL. That said, this current, particular lengthy suspension is based on Draymond's past action; not the past-perfect ones, but the ones that began with him punching his teammate Jordan Poole in practice, followed by the "Stomp," the "Chokehold" and finally the whirling backhand punch to Nurkic's head. 

It would be fair to say that all the earlier violence prior to "The Punch" were symptoms of a progressive increase in violence. Fair, but that was not my experience. Like Draymond, I was called upon to be the "enforcer." But unlike Draymond, there was a limit to my aggression, as there were to the aggression of other so called "enforcers." 

Unfortunately, Draymond's lack of control is, to my way of thinking, a sign of a serious anger-management problem, one that as a retired teacher I saw plenty of teaching high school. Sadly, for the Warriors, it is my experience there is only one way to treat such behavior and that is as mental illness. 

Draymond needs long-term counseling. The length of that counseling must be determined by professionals, not by the team. The Warriors may have to lose Draymond for this season. For his own welfare, and I dare say for their own. In the state Draymond is today, he is no value to the team. Allowing him to play after only a brief suspension with lack of adequate counseling, Draymond will only cause more team chaos.  It is sad and at the same time, it is the reality. 

For my closing poem, here is a Haiku.

ROOKIE TROUGH THE WINDOW

On a branch, two Crows
Outside seated on a branch 
Watching him practice. 

                 Tom Meschery
 

COURTS OF MANY COLORS

 With apologies to the Old Testament, the NBA has managed to bring forward the Biblical story to the 21st century in spades. Then added glimmer and shimmer and primary colors and in the process made seeing the basketball on TV nearly impossible. And as one fan at the Lakers/Pelicans game in Las Vegas put it, I was there to watch players, but some of those wonderful moves  had to compete with the damn court. 

What is the answer? It seems obvious.

Aside from the awful courts, the tournament was a resounding success. It brought life to the early part of the NBA season, which has been, except for dedicated hoop nerds, the ho-hum part of the season when teams are trying to figure things out. 

Out of this tournament came a surprisingly interesting Finals matchup: The Big Market Los Angeles Lakers vs the Small Market, Indiana Pacers. The Pacers are led by a young upcoming Super Star, Tyreese Haliburton, and the Lakers will, of course, be led by the "Old" Mega Super Star Lebron James. Let's hope that the NBA League has the foresight to promote this market matchup. And not feel sorry for themselves that it was not Antetokounmpo vs James. 

Speaking of Tyreese Haliburton, he is one of the most unique players I've seen come into the NBA in a long time, a true point guard who dishes out double digit assists and also scores and plays defense. This is Oscar Robertson, Magic Johnson territory. I wonder if the Kings fans will forever wonder what the best duo would have been: Sabonis/Fox or Sabonis/Halliburton? 

I don't mean to leave on a negative note, but does anyone object to the double screen while watching players shoot freethrows on TV, that the NBA gives the larger screen to the commercial and the small screen to the player shooting? I'm getting pretty darn sick of all the advertising on TV interfering with content. I understand the league needs the ads to pay for the content, but do we have to be constantly reminded to bow at the altar of consumerism? 

Here's a poem to make up for my last littel rant. Morton Marcus was my mentor poet and coached high school basketball in San Francisco in the '60s. His memorial annual poetry reading was just held in Santa Cruz in November. 

A Literary Memoir

     For Morton Marcus

 Is this where poetry starts, Mort,
with a jab and a right cross, uncle
in your corner, trainer and cut-man,
Jewish Mafia gunned down,
and all the intervening year
you tell me about fighting with words?
Some wins, some draws, few losses
but enough to cost you friends and family.
 
I have no problem seeing you in the ring,
a welter weight with quick hands,
jabs that keep your opponents off balance,
no dancing, moving straight forward,
accepting two punches for one,
what you believe it takes to write.
You got to get bloody, you say.
 
We are sitting together a month
before your death. We have done this before
talking late about sports and poetry,
sometimes forgetting there’s a difference,
your punches, my hook shots,
a game I played that you admired,
a poem you wrote that knocked me out.

 CLUES SO FAR

No question that it's too early to make definitive predication except which teams will be at the top and which team will be at the bottom. The Athletic, a truly dandy source for sports, has said it all, so I'm not going to rehash the obvious Celtics/Nugget etc. 

What comes to mind this early? The Tournament. Fans are all over the place on this topic, ranging from Who Cares to Wow! The airplane landing stipes motif down the middle of the court is well done. As I said to a lot of friends and commented on The Athletic, the dark colors are difficult for TV viewers because it is hard to see the ball well, so it becomes a distraction. This is an easy fix: all teams use pastels as some already have.  The NBA needed something to pump up interest in the early part of the season and going to the soccer tradition of tournaments was a good idea. Fans need to give it some time to get used to until it too, like soccer, becomes a tradition. One idea the NBA should consider to up the competitiveness is redesign the uniforms by state, instead of team city by team city, ie: California Clippers; California Warriors, etc. And add another bunch of money to sponsor each winning states Civic Education, God knows we need emphasis in this area the way things are in today's anti-Democracy climate. Imagine the championship in Vegas being between the Colorado Nuggets vs the Florida Heat. Governors would be making side bets. Of course there would have to be group chnages next season to make sure this kind of state competion would happen. It can be done. 

I was really disappointed in my Warrior, Draymond Green putting a chokc hold on Rudy Gobert. It's pretty deja vue all over again, when Draymond gets in a rage, but choke holds are super dangerous. As a black man, Draymond should know better. Males of his race have been terrorized by choke holds for a long time. Connected but unconnected, I thought Gobert's sanctimonious response disingenuous as I remember a few years back the Frenchman giving his teammates COVID as a JOKE. Un BLAGUE, vous est fou? Draymond, we need you on the court. As a retired English teacher, may I suggest an anger management class.  

I'm high on the Warriors two draft choices this year, Point guard Brandin Podzinski and Power Forward, Trace Davis. One thing though, Podzinski, dude, you got to stop with the tongue thing. MJ did that already. And, you're not that good yet. 

I appreciate players who don't do a whole lot of screaming after every good play they make. It's satisfying to watch professionalism without the Look at Me, Look at Me B.S. High on my list of grownups is Keegan Murry of the Sacramento Kings who saves his celebrations for when they are really special. I think Trace-Davis of the Warriors has that grown up attitude toward celebrating on the court. Curry did too, but I've noticed the last couple of years, Steph doing a little drama, but if you're Curry most of the stuff you do is dramatic. 

I want to readers to consider what players in the pro basketball changed the game. I'm not talking improved a position. I mean basketball was never played the same way again type of thing. Who was the first to popularize the jump shot; who made the league a Big Man's League? I believe one can say that the NBA was never the same after Joe Fulks who popularized the jump shot or never the same after Miken, never the same after Wilt, and never the same after Steph Curry. i'll let you all argue about all the rest from the Cousys to the Doctors to the Birds and the Shaqs. I'm thinkng of adding Jokic to my list of game changers. What do you think. Will the NBA game in a few years be a game of Bigs who can shoot threes and have handles? Will players under, say, 6'6" be possible? Will the NBA become a league of Brobdingnagians?

I am always impressed with the Miami Heat? They build around two core guys, Adebayo and Jimmy Buckets. And if they lose good players along the way, they always manage to find the correct replacements. They lose Straus and Vincent. They get Jaime Jaquez in the first round. A couple of other thoughts about teams. Imagine the Orlando Magic with a real point guard. Is Jrue Holiday the best point guard in the NBA? No apologies. needed to Step Curry who's the best All-Around guard in the NBA. Has OKC finally decided to play for keeps, no more first round draft choice gathering like a squirrel for winter? How long will it be before Zion is injured? 6'5" at 280 lbs is untenable. How long befor Kyrie goes off the farm? Big shout out for Tyrese Maxie, proving the 76ers don't need James the Selfish. A similar shout out to De'Aaron Fox for continuing to improve his game. Got to be in cosideration for the Paris Olympics. Is there a faster player in the league than Fox?' If the Knicks get a consistent 3 pt floor spacer they could be spoilers in the East. Clippers are old and slow. Why is Lakers' AD so inconsistent? Is he out of shape? 

Here I am reading my ode to cable cars at a San Francisco event introducing the Warriors new jersey honoring the Cable Car and he first jersey with San Fransisco on its front. 

FOLLOWING UP

 The pre-season has ended, so I need to follow up on my team evaluations. I'll be brief. Let's start with the East. Jrue went to Boston, which makes them my pick to win the Eastern Conference. Buck come in a disappointing second because the Damion/Giannis combo does not prove as effective in the playoffs when Big D counts. It is always interesting to see what rabbit the Heat pull out of their top hats. Because of this, I pick them coming in third unless Morey gets off his duff and get something meaningful for Hardin. Is Harden the worst teammate in the history of the NBA? The rest of the East is generally very average.

The Western Conference is the focus of most of the talking heads attention. And rightly so as there has been a lot of good players from the East go West Young Men. So what are my picks for the West? Let me get my loyalty-pick out of the way first. The Warriors will make into the top four playoff slots. They will be the surprise team in the NBA this coming season. I base my opinion on a lot of factors such as; The CP3 addition is going to work out well; the bench is vastly improved; Wiggins is back for a full season; Klay will regain his shooting touch; Dario Saric is a much better version of Belijca of their championship seaon in '22. The Poole incident is behind them; Kuminga looks like the player they drafted for finally; and their two draft choices look like they might actully provide rotation minutes along with a more confident and season Moses Moddy and do well. and of course there is Steph Curry.

But, realistically, if anybody is counting out the Nuggest to win the West, they do so at their own risk. They have all their starters back, and it is my belief that they will not miss Brown and Green as much as everybody is predicting.  

I like Smart with the Griz, but do not trust Ja. Still, I believe in the story of the Prodigal Son, so I wish Ja the best maturity. The Twolve will make the playoffs, but so might the Sacramento Kings, especially if they stay as healthy as they did last season. 

It's going to be a battle ti the West, that's for sure. 

For three of the talking head favorites in the West, the success will depends entirely on the health of their players. The Suns could be great, but only if Durant stays healthy. The Lakers could be great, but only if AD stays healthy. The Clippers could be a force as long as Leonard and/or  George stay healthy. God help them if they lose Mann and get Hardin. Hardin is the Kiss of Death. 

Forget Dallas as long as they have Kyrie, However I must admit I'm being subjective. Kyrie's racism gets in the way of any objectivity on my part. And, why do I think Donic is still carrying around his baby fat?

I would mention the Pelicans, and I wish I could, but is anyone willing to predict Zion will make it through the season without a major injury? 6'5" at 280 lbs is untenable. 

Etc:

I wonder if anybody in Duck land is wondering what's up with their head coach, Dan Lanning? Why does he take such risks? They would have gone to the Rose Bowl last season had he not called for an onside kick, and this year the Ducks would never have lost to the Huskies if the Coach had punted and trusted his Defense. If I were the Ducks' Defensive Coordinator, I'd be truly pissed. 

I'm also pissed. Why? Take a look at the college football standings: The PAC 12 has two teams in the top ten, the Trojans and the Ducks, and three other PAC 12 teams in the top 25 and the doofuses who ran the PAC12 couldn't get a good TV contract? Give me a break! 

Just so I'm not ignoring baseball's World Series entirely, here's an interesting and add poem about the sport, I wish I knew who wrote it.

STELAE   Anonymous

There are stelae at Palenque
that are nothing but names and numbers.
Homeruns, strikeouts, and stolen bases
for Hunahpa and Hunahpu
who played the sacred game back when
you had to claw for every run
not like today. The losing manager
got disemboweled on the mounds
by the knife of the morning star.
I grow older, hombre, or the beardless
mozus striding for the plate grows young.
At 40 I played in Jalatlaco
place name meaning “sandy ball court.”
The Zapotec lefty decked me
i como se dice beanball en espanol?
And then for once in my mortal
vagabond middle-infielder career
I got good wood on the pelota.
It sailed toward the sacred ring
reached the ancient wall on a bounce.
Hunahpa and Hunahpu
played ball against the Gods
in Xibalba. They lost.
They got their heads cut off
and turned them into baseball
and stuck them on a tree.
A girl ate them. She had babies
Hunahpa and Hunahpu.
They finished second two years running.
They smoked the candles of the underworld.
They used a mosquito in centerfield
for steal signs. They stole them blind.
They sacrificed, they had the long ball.
They had defensive magic. They grew
the changes; they threw the split-finger.
You remember the sequence from Game Six.
The Mayans carved the standings
into statistics of heaven,
these cyclic fratals of the endless game.