Cammo Top 25 (Preseason)

1. Ohio State
2. Notre Dame
3. Oklahoma
4. Texas
5. USC
6. West Virginia
7. LSU
8. Florida
9. California
10. Miami
11. Florida State
12. Louisville
13. Auburn
14. Michigan
15. Clemson
16. Oregon
17. Georgia
18. Iowa
19. Virginia Tech
20. Nebraska
21. Penn State
22. South Carolina
23. Boston College
24. Arizona
25. Tennessee

Top 25 All Time NBA Players

Recently someone challenged me to name the top 25 NBA players of all time. After some careful consideration, this is the list I came up with.


1. Michael Jordan
2. Wilt Chamberlain
3. Bill Russell
4. Larry Bird
5. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
6. Oscar Robertson
7. Magic Johnson
8. Shaquille O'Neal
9. Hakeem Olajuwon
10. Julius Erving
11. Jerry West
12. Tim Duncan
13. Karl Malone
14. Bob Pettit
15. Moses Malone
16. Charles Barkley
17. John Stockton
18. Elgin Baylor
19. Rick Barry
20. Artis Gilmore
21. John Havlicek
22. George Gervin
23. Scottie Pippen
24. George Mikan
25. Isiah Thomas

Picking The Real All Stars

Every year the fans and the coach butcher the MLB All Star teams. Thankfully for the last 2 years I have been here to save the day and to tell the masses who the real All Stars are.



American League

Starters

P- Roy Halladay (Blue Jays)
C- Joe Mauer (Twins)
1B- David Ortiz (Red Sox)
2B- Chone Figgans (Angels)
SS- Derek Jeter (Yankees)
3B- Alex Rodriguez (Yankees)
OF- Manny Ramirez (Red Sox)
OF- Jermaine Dye (White Sox)
OF- Ichiro (Mariners)

Pitchers

SP- Johan Santana (Twins)
SP- Fransisco Liriano (Twins)
SP- Mike Mussina (Yankees)
SP- John Lackey (Angels)
SP- Scott Kazmir (Devil Rays)
SP- Justin Verlander (Tigers)
SP- Kenny Rogers (Tigers)
SP- Jose Contreras (White Sox)
RP- Jonathan Papelbon (Red Sox)
RP- Mariano Rivera (Yankees)
RP- BJ Ryan (Blue Jays)
RP- Huston Street (A’s)
RP- Bobby Jenks (White Sox)

Reserves

C- Ivan Rodriguez (Tigers)
1B- Jim Thome (White Sox)
1B- Paul Konerko (White Sox)
2B- Tadihito Iguchi (White Sox)
SS- Miguel Tejada (Orioles)
SS- Michael Young (Rangers)
3B- Mark Teahen (Royals)
OF- Carl Crawford (Devil Rays)
OF- Vernon Wells (Blue Jays)
OF- Grady Sizemore (Indians)
OF- Alex Rios (Blue Jays)
OF- Vladimir Guerrero (Angels)


National League

Starters

P- Brandon Webb (Diamondbacks)
C- Michael Barrett (Cubs)
1B- Albert Pujols (Cardinals)
2B- Chase Utley (Phillies)
SS- Jose Reyes (Mets)
3B- David Wright (Mets)
OF- Alfonso Soriano (Nationals)
OF- Carlos Beltran (Mets)
OF- Andruw Jones (Braves)

Pitchers

SP- Chris Capuano (Brewers)
SP- Pedro Martinez (Mets)
SP- Carlos Zambrano (Cubs)
SP- Brad Penny (Dodgers)
SP- Jason Schmidt (Giants)
SP- Tom Glavine (Mets)
SP- Chris Carpenter (Cardinals)
SP- Bronson Arroyo (Reds)
RP- Trevor Hoffman (Padres)
RP- Jason Isringhausen (Cardinals)
RP- Tom Gordon (Phillies)
RP- Billy Wagner (Mets)

Reserves

C- Brian McCann (Braves)
1B- Lance Berkman (Astros)
1B- Ryan Howard (Phillies)
2B- Dan Uggla (Marlins)
2B- Brandon Phillips (Reds)
SS- Edgar Renteria (Braves)
3B- Miguel Cabrera (Marlins)
3B- Scott Rolen (Cardinals)
OF- Carlos Lee (Brewers)
OF- Jason Bay (Pirates)
OF- Matt Holiday (Rockies)
UT- Nomar Garciaparra (Dodgers)
UT- Freddy Sanchez (Pirates)

World Cup Recap

This will likely be my first and last soccer post (at least for 4 years) so I will try touch everything in one tidy post. It may jump around some and be sort of rapid fire.


My All World Cup Team

GK: Gianluigi Buffon (Italy)
DEF: Fabio Cannavaro (Italy)
DEF: Gianluca Zumbrota (Italy)
DEF: Roberto Ayala (Argentina)
DEF: John Terry (England)
MF: Zinedine Zidane (France)
MF: Andrea Pirlo (Italy)
MF: Maniche (Portugal)
MF: Michael Ballack (Germany)
FOR: Miroslav Klose (Germany)
FOR: Thierry Henry (France)

SUB: Kaka (Brazil)
SUB: Ze Roberto (Brazil)
SUB: Hernan Crespo (Argentina)


MVP: Fabio Cannavaro (Italy)


Random Thoughts

* Is anyone else tired of Nike pushing unproven losers on the American public? First it was Dan and Dave...then it was Sebastian Telfair...then it was Michelle Wei...and now it is the USA soccer team. What those 4 have in common aside from never winning anything, is that they are all Nike creations. No one knew about them or cared about them until Nike told us to. Nike is no longer signing star athletes to wear their shoes, they are signing random athletes and then trying to shove them down our throats regardless of their lack of merit. It got so bad I was almost rooting against the USA team.

* Speaking of Team USA, did they suck or what? Bruce Arenas botched this team horribly and deserves to lose his job. Pending Nike's approve of course. It does not take a rocket scientist to realize you need more than one forward to score goals. And what is the point of only having one forward anyways if you're still going to give up easy goals? Not that any of this matters because the 2 best American players did not even bother to show up for the World Cup anyways. I am looking at you Donovan and Beasley. All the hype for these 2 and they did nothing. Arena tried to put the blame on the MLS for this debacle, but the truth of the matter is the MLS guys came to play and the Americans playing in Europe did not.

* The World Cup referees make the NBA refs look competent. That is not an easy task. They were bad all the way through and especially terrible for the USA. Made even worse by the fact that the USA beat now champion Italy up and down the field but thanks to horrible officiating by a guy already kicked out of FIFA for being a horrible official (That makes less sense than the WNBA huh?) Italy managed to get out with a draw and the US were all but left for dead. I am not saying the US were cheated or deserved to advance, but they had no chance to do so playing against the group of death and the refs.

* I do not often find myself feeling bad for a guy who viscously headbutts people, but today I did. While my hatred of all things French is both well documented and the reason I was rooting for Italy, I still feel bad that Zidane will end his legendary career as a goat. Zidane is one of the top 5 soccer players ever, and the fact that his career is ending in shame after what looked to be a story book ending unfolding is just brutal. But he is French, so screw him.

* I am glad Italy won, as from what I saw, they deserved to. That won the best group without giving up a goal and then went through some brutal teams to win the Cup. Good for them. Now we can move on to talking about Baseball and Football.

2007 NBA Draft Big Board

The 2006 draft is now officially behind us and it is time to look forward to the 2007 draft. This draft looks to be absolutely loaded and should be very interesting to see shake out. Here is the early look at the top 50 prospects for 2007.



1. Greg Oden (7’0’’, C, Ohio State, Fresh.)
2. Kevin Durant (6‘10‘’, SF, Texas, Fresh.)
3. Joakim Noah (6’11’’, PF, Florida, Jr.)
4. Brandan Wright (6’10’’, PF, North Carolina, Fresh.)
5. Josh McRoberts (6’10’’, PF, Duke, Soph.)
6. Thaddeus Young (6‘8‘’, SF, Georgia Tech, Fresh.)
7. Brandon Rush (6'7'', SG, Kansas, Soph.)
8. Ante Tomic (7’2’’, C, Croatia)
9. Tiago Splitter (6'11'', PF, Brazil)
10. Yi Jianlian (7’0’’, PF, China)
11. Spencer Hawes (6’11’’, C, Washington, Fresh.)
12. Al Horford (6'9'', PF, Florida, Jr.)
13. Julian Wright (6‘8‘’, SF, Kansas, Soph.)
14. Marcus Williams (6‘7‘’, SG, Arizona, Soph.)
15. Ronald Steele (6‘2‘’, PG, Alabama, Jr.)
16. Roy Hibbert (7’2’’, C, Georgetown, Jr.)
17. Alexis Ajinca (7’0’’, PF, France)
18. Marco Belinelli (6’6’’, SG, Italy)
19. Corey Brewer (6’8’’, SF, Florida, Jr.)
20. Jeff Green (6’8’’, SF, Georgetown, Jr.)
21. Jason Smith (7’0’’, C, Colorado State, Jr.)
22. Tyler Hansbrough (6‘9‘’, PF, North Carolina, Soph.)
23. Dominic James (5‘10‘’, PG, Marquette, Soph.)
24. Richard Roby (6’5’’, SG, Colorado, Jr.)
25. Luc Richard Mbah a Moute (6‘7‘’, SF, UCLA, Soph.)
26. Gerald Henderson (6’6’’, SG, Duke, Fresh.)
27. Rudy Fernandez (6'5'', SG, Spain)
28. Aaron Gray (7'0'', C, Pitt, Sr.)
29. Mario Chalmers (6’2’’, PG, Kansas, Soph.)
30. Al Thornton (6’7’’, SF, Florida State, Sr.)
31. Arron Afflalo (6’5’’, SG, UCLA, Jr.)
32. Brad Newley (6’6’’, SG, Australia)
33. Nemanja Aleksandrov (7’0’’, SF, Serbia)
34. Gabriel Pruitt (6’4’’, PG, USC, Jr.)
35. Nick Fazekas (6’11’’, PF, Nevada, Sr.)
36. Acie Law (6‘3‘’, PG, Texas A&M, Sr.)
37. Sasha Kahn (6’11’’, C, Kansas, Jr.)
38. DeVon Hardin (6’11’’, C, California, Jr.)
39. Glen Davis (6‘8‘’, PF, LSU, Jr.)
40. Malik Hairston (6’6’’, SG, Oregon, Jr.)
41. Joseph Jones (6‘9‘’, PF, Texas A&M, Jr.)
42. Uros Tripkovic (6’5’’, PG, Serbia)
43. Sun Yue (6’9’’, SG, China)
44. Nick Young (6’6’’, SG, USC, Jr.)
45. Marko Tomas (6'8'',SG, Croatia)
46. Morris Almond (6’6’’, SG, Rice, Sr.)
47. Mustafa Shakur (6’3’’, PG, Arizona, Sr.)
48. Jermareo Davidson (6‘10‘’, PF, Alabama, Sr.)
49. Alando Tucker (6‘5‘’, SG, Wisconsin, Sr.)
50. Reyshawn Terry (6’8’’, SF, North Carolina, Sr.)