OU football: Fired up about Landry Jones?
Landry Jones will be back on Owen Field this Saturday for Oklahoma’s Spring Game.
It’s a place where many Sooner fans thought he’d never play again.
Then, there are some Sooner fans hoped he’d never play there again.
Even though the OU quarterback is returning for his senior season with a chance to break just about every school passing record and as one of the most ballyhooed players in college football — he’ll be on all the preseason Heisman Trophy watch lists — there are plenty of folks in the Sooner Nation who are less than fired up about him still wearing the crimson and cream.
So, Sooner fans, what do you think about Jones’ return?
Are you pumped?
Are you bummed?
I want to know what you think. Tell me why you feel the way that you do about Jones spurning the NFL and returning to OU for another season. You can comment here on my blog, or you can email me directly. Either way, be sure to include your full name, your city of residence and an email address where I can contact you.
Thunder: Please, no player-coach drama
This whole Dwight Howard-Stan Van Gundy thing is like a bad soap opera.
First, talk started to circulate that the Magic star wanted the coach fired. Then, Howard denied that he ever made any such demands. And now, Van Gundy says that he was told by high-ranking team personnel that Howard asked for his coaching head on a platter.
It’s enough to make your head spin.
And enough to make you hope we never have any such madness in Oklahoma City.
Our fair city’s time as an NBA outpost has been relatively short, so maybe it’s only a matter of time before we experience one of these player-coach spats up close and personal. But I really hope that isn’t the case. I’d be happy if these types of things were left to other teams in other places.
These things are a big ol’ mess.
I mean, here is the Magic, fighting for seeding in the playoffs and trying to prepare for the postseason. (Of course, there are other Howard-related issues floating out there. Does he want to be traded? Does he want to stay? Should the team deal him and get something in return or hang on for dear life in trying to keep the best big man on the planet? But those are issues for another day.) And now, they’ve got to deal with this very public (apparently) rift between the team’s best player and its coach.
That doesn’t sound like any fun at all.
I guess it could happen one day in Oklahoma City. Kevin Durant could get so frustrated about the direction of the team that he could barge into Sam Presti’s office and demand that Scott Brooks go. Word could trickle out. KD could deny it. Brooks could confirm it.
I’d take a pass on that kind of drama.
Sure, it seems crazy to think something like that could happen. KD isn’t that type of guy, right? He’s a good dude. He’s a stand-up man. He’s not going to resort to such back-handed, secret-squirrel antics.
But here’s the thing — there was a time when I thought Dwight Howard would never do this kind of thing either.
He was a McDonald’s All-American the year that the game was played in Oklahoma City. I had a chance to talk to him then when he was being talked about as the presumptive No. 1 pick in the upcoming NBA Draft, and he came across as one of the most mature high school hot shots that I’ve ever encountered.
Here’s a bit of what I wrote:
Dwight Howard is a choir boy.
No, really.
He sings bass in the top choral group at Southwest Atlanta Christian Academy, but even if he didn’t, the McDonald’s All-American might still have the choir-boy status. He is a member of the chess club, reads to kindergartners, drives a 1984 Ford Crown Victoria that cost $900 and counts among his goals getting a cross added to the NBA logo.
Like high schooler LeBron James a year ago, Howard is expected to be the first player taken in the NBA draft. That is where the similarities end.
“I’m not LeBron,” Howard said after practice for the McDonald’s game, which will be played Wednesday at the Ford Center. “I’m a totally different type of player. He’s a great player, but I’m not LeBron.”
Howard is the anti-LeBron.
Even though their differences begin with their styles — James has a small-forward frame and a point-guard game, while Howard is a 6-foot-11 power forward in the mold of Alonzo Mourning and A’mare Stoudemire — the contrasts extend far beyond that.
A year ago, James became the most ballyhooed player that high school basketball had ever seen. His story appeared in national magazines, and his games played on cable television. He ran with high-brow celebrities and drove a tripped-out Hummer, and that was before signing a $90 million deal with Nike.
Many argued that it was too much too soon, that James was example of everything that was wrong with sports.
No such criticisms have befallen Howard. Quite the opposite, actually.
“The complaint that young guys are dragging down the league doesn’t apply to this guy,” one NBA scout told Sports Illustrated earlier this month. “He has a Duncanesque demeanor that makes him seem even more mature than LeBron and Kobe were when they were coming out of high school.
“We need more like him in the NBA.”
***
Choir boy? Anti-LeBron? Ducanesque?
I’m pretty sure no one is saying any of that about Howard these days.
The whole thing in Orlando is just a colossal mess. Will the team bow to Howard’s will in an attempt to keep him in a Magic jersey? Will it deny his request and risk driving him away? Or will it fire Van Gundy, then possibly lose Howard anyway?
I’m not sure what’s going to happen there, but I sure hope nothing like this happens here for a long, long time.
Thunder: Angering the Heat? Not smart
I’m all for the Thunder playing physical basketball.
That’s one of the things I loved most about the team’s performance Wednesday night at Miami. The Thunder attacked the Heat on the offensive end and got into every ballhandler on the defense end. That made for some good basketball.
But you know what didn’t make for good basketball?
Ugly fouls that riled up the Heat.
Miami coasted through the first quarter-plus of the game, and while it was playing OK, it wasn’t keeping pace with Oklahoma City. The Thunder built an 11-point lead at one point in the first half, and when it did, you started to wonder if this would be another double-digit victory against the Heat.
But then, Kendrick Perkins karate chopped Dwyane Wade’s head.
And then, Russell Westbrook shoved LeBron James from behind on a breakaway dunk.
Neither play was smart, and frankly, Westbrook’s foul was downright dangerous. Had it happened to Russ, we all know how he would’ve probably reacted. He would’ve jumped up. He would’ve puffed his chest out. He would’ve taken a few I-can’t-believe-you-did-that steps toward the offender. It’s a reaction we’ve seen before, after all.
Each play incensed the Heat faithful. You could hear that, even if you were back in Oklahoma City watching on TV.
But those plays also fired up the Heat. You could see it just as plainly as you could hear the Miami fans booing. The Heat started playing inspired basketball. Angry and fury-filled, but inspired nevertheless. And in the process, it ended the first half on a 16-8 run that totally changed the complexion of Wednesday night’s game.
Sometimes, the Heat have backed down when pushed around, when opponents have gotten physical with them, but these guys saw what happened Wednesday night differently. In their minds, the Thunder wasn’t playing physical, it was playing dirty.
And that made them mad — and better than they would’ve been otherwise. A team that doesn’t always play with an edge suddenly had reason to play that way.
Like I said, I’m all for the Thunder being physical. Drive the ball to the hoop. Harass any opponent who catches the ball. All of that is great. But when you do things that your opponent perceives as over the line, it rarely ends well. It sure didn’t end well for the Thunder on Wednesday night, and if these two teams end up in the NBA Finals, here’s guessing the Heat will not have forgotten what the Thunder did.
Thunder: Skip Bayless should listen to KD
So, Kevin Durant took Skip Bayless to task.
Oh, what fun.
If you haven’t heard yet, our man Darnell Mayberry asked the Thunder superstar before Monday night’s game what he thought of the ESPN commentator always bagging on teammate Russell Westbrook.
Durant seemed ready with his answer.
“That guy doesn’t know a thing about basketball,” he said.
And Durant didn’t seem to be foolin’ around.
Now, the truth is Bayless knows a thing or two about basketball, but he clearly has a blind spot when it comes to Westbrook. He can’t see that Westbrook is not a “traditional point guard.”
Well, let me rephrase that. I suspect he can see that about Westbrook, but he just can’t accept it. He can’t come to grips with the fact that he’s every bit as likely to shoot as he is to pass. He just can’t get over the fact that some games Westbrook is going to shoot more than Durant.
Durant doesn’t seem to have a problem with it.
The other Boys in Blue don’t seem to have a problem with it, either.
But good ol’ Skip does.
That’s cool. He’s entitled to his opinion. He’s allowed to watch and ascertain and pontificate. But the facts just don’t back him up.
The hang up Bayless has with Westbrook shooting more than Durant? The Thunder has a 20-4 record in games that Westbrook took more shots than Durant. That means in games where Durant takes more shots than Westbrook, including Monday’s 94-88 loss to the Grizzlies, the Thunder is 20-9. If you’re scoring at home — ahem, Skip — that’s a worse record.
Considering those numbers, Westbrook should be shooting more.
Durant seems to think so.
“I’m better when I’m out there facilitating, rebounding, defending and being more efficient on my shots with less shots,” he said.
Now, no one is suggesting that Durant needs to start turning down open looks. The guy is obviously one of the greatest scorers on the planet, and he needs to score and score a lot for the Thunder to win.
But you know what? Westbrook can score it a little bit, too.
There aren’t too many players in the association who can get to the rim like he can. And that little jumper at the free-throw line extended? It’s a thing of beauty. Why would the Thunder want him to start denying that part of his game?
Just like it would be silly for Durant to start turning down open looks, it would be equally silly for Westbrook not to use those skills.
Russell Westbrook will never be confused with John Stockton or Jason Kidd or even Chris Paul. He’s not a pass-first point guard. And frankly, the Thunder is just fine with that. In fact, it prefers Westbrook the way he is.
So does Kevin Durant.
Maybe it’s time Skip Bayless came to terms with that.
Here’s guessing, though, he might have a slightly different reaction to what the Thunder star had to say.
Power Lunch Chat with Jenni Carlson
OSU Football: Blackmon character concerns?
The NFL Draft is less than a month away.
You know what that means.
Let the spin doctoring commence!
Teams have been known to drop all sorts of information (and misinformation) to their contacts in the sports media to achieve their desired outcomes. Maybe they want to move up in the draft. Maybe they want to trade a pick. Maybe they want to make a player look not quite so good to teams picking ahead of them.
Remember all that talk before the 2007 draft about how Adrian Peterson’s injuries might be a big red flags to teams.
Seems like he’s turned out OK.
I was reminded of all this Friday morning as I read our gal Gina Mizell’s story on Justin Blackmon and Brandon Weeden being invited to work out for the Cleveland Browns. Everyone figured that might happen since both former Oklahoma State standouts would be logical targets for the woeful Browns.
But the bit that hit me square between the eyes was that Pro Football Weekly’s Nolan Nawrocki said on a conference call that Blackmon has character issues.
“He has shown a lot of talent, but more and more concerns are coming up about the maturity level,” Nawrocki said. “That needs to be investigated closely.”
(Of course, Nawrocki also said that “many left his pro day unimpressed” when in reality Blackmon’s 4.46 40-yard dash time had everyone buzzing, so take his analysis for what it’s worth.)
Everyone knows, of course, that Blackmon had that DUI during the 2010 season and served a one-game suspension, but everyone in our neck of the woods also knows how contrite and apologetic Blackmon was after the incident. Less than 48 hours after his arrest, Blackmon sat in front of the media and, by extension, the Cowboy Nation and said how sorry he was.
“I made a mistake, and I take full responsibility for it,” he said. “I’m embarrassed to be in this position. I am truly sorry to my family, my friends and Oklahoma State.”
I probably don’t need to tell you, but it’s rare for an athlete to stand up and speak out after an off-field incident. Not just at the college level, but at the pro level, too. What Blackmon did that October day took maturity the likes of which we rarely see in sports.
He was even asked about why he decided to do a press conference.
“To prove I’m not that guy and own up to my mistakes,” he said. “I did it, and I should be punished for it.”
Now, I’m not suggesting that what he did in that press conference erases what he did a couple nights before on a suburban Dallas freeway. But if you’re going to look at the times when he was immature, you also need to look at the ones when he’s been mature.
And there are plenty of those.
Playing through an ankle sprain that would’ve sidelined most players in Bedlam two years ago. Deciding to return for his junior year because he wanted to better prepare himself mentally for the NFL and for the NFL life. Going home to Ardmore regularly to hang out with friends from Plainview High. Befriending a cancer patient who became his biggest fan.
I know you’ve heard the story of Blackmon and Olivia Hamilton, the young girl from Sperry who’s been battling cancer for more than two years. It’s been often told. But there are little tidbits of their story that have gone untold that bring into question this whole “character issues” thing.
Take, for example, this one: last fall, Olivia was a cheerleader for one of Sperry’s little-league football teams. One of the team’s games happened to be in Stillwater, and when Olivia got to town, she sent Blackmon a text message and told him that she was there.
Olivia’s mom, Jennifer, admits that she never thought anything would come of it. Blackmon’s a college kid, she figured, with better things to do than come to a little-league football game.
Lo and behold, Blackmon showed up.
But wait, there’s more.
Not only did he come to the game, but he also joined in on the fun. He snagged one of the megaphones and helped with the cheers.
Now, I’ll be the first to admit, I don’t know all the ins and outs of Blackmon’s life. I don’t know what he does with his free time. I don’t know if he has any bad vices or ugly secrets. NFL teams, of course, have an army of investigators with unlimited resources who look into those sorts of things.
But I know what I’ve seen and I know what I’ve heard. And if I was in the war room with the Browns — or any other NFL team — on draft day, I’d tell them that they should have no reservations about character issues with Blackmon.
That’s not spin doctoring. That’s the truth.
Thunder: Kevin Durant scores big in late night
Kevin Durant had a big night Wednesday.
No, the Thunder wasn’t playing, but the Oklahoma City superstar was in the spotlight nevertheless. He made an appearance on “Jimmy Kimmel Live”, and as always when the stage is big and the lights are bright, KD was big time.
There were no major revelations or anything. Kimmel asked him about playing flag football during the lockout, about wearing a backpack to press conferences during the playoffs last year and about living in Oklahoma City. It’s all stuff we’ve heard before.
But what KD said about living in Oklahoma City was pretty great.
Kimmel: You signed a contract extension in Oklahoma City, which I think a lot of guys would go, “Oklahoma City, it’s fine, but I want to go to the big city where stuff is really going on.” But you really must like it there.
KD: I love it there. It’s small town. People are nice. I can do what I want.
Kimmel: Could you do anything you wanted there?
KD: Yeah, I can. I am 6-9, so I stand out a little bit.
Kimmel: I would think so.
KD: But I can do a little bit.
Kimmel: It’s the only professional team they have in town.
KD: There’s no hiding. … But if it’s after 7 or 8, I’m pretty good. I’m pretty cool.
Now, before you start thinking KD was knocking on OKC, calling us a sleepy hamlet where people all turn in when the sun goes down, you’d need to see the look on his face. He was giving Kimmel this sideways glance, and there’s was just a hint of a smirk on his face.
Sort of a you’re-an-LA-guy-and-you-think-you-know-but-you-don’t look.
Then, Kimmel asked Durant if he goes out when he’s in Oklahoma City.
KD: The biggest thing to do is go to the Apple Store, so I hang out there a lot.
Kimmel: Do you?
KD: Yeah.
Again, KD had that look on his face. The whole thing drew a big laugh in LA where we can only assume that people think everyone in OKC rides a stagecoach to work, but you could tell that Durant was really horsing around. He was playing to the audience.
And you know what? I love that Durant is playing coy about Oklahoma City. It’s almost like a secret handshake to our fair city — he’s got this great thing going, he knows it, we know it, and he’s trying to keep it just between us.
It was almost like he was giving us a wink and a nudge as he was saying those things.
There is no doubt in my mind that Kevin Durant loves being here. A big part of that is the franchise for which he plays, but he always loves on Oklahoma City. He loves the fans. He loves the passion. And frankly, I get the feeling that he loves the pace of life.
It suits him just fine that the biggest thing to do is go to the Apple Store.
(Wink, wink.)
Here’s a look at the video:
Thunder: What have you done for tickets?
The Thunder has always been a hot ticket.
This season, it’s down right scorching.
Whether on ticket brokerage websites or on the street, tickets are going for hundreds of bucks. Sure, the big games are demanding the biggest price tags, but the demand is still high and the price is steep even for the not-so-marquee games.
Which got us thinking here at headquarters.
To what lengths are Thunder fans going to buy tickets?
I want to hear from you.
Maybe you’ve willingly shelled out more for tickets than you pay on your mortgage every month. Maybe you’ve used some unconventional methods to find tickets. Maybe you’ve given plasma or sold a kidney to support your Thunder obsession.
(OK, I’m just joking about that last one — unless of course you have sold plasma or a kidney. In that case, I definitely want to hear from you!)
Tell me your story about what you’ve done to get Thunder tickets. You can either post a comment here or email me at jcarlson@opubco.com. Be sure to include your full name plus your city of residence. A phone number or email address would be great, too.
Who knows? You might see your name in a future edition of The Oklahoman.
MLB: Former RedHawk reveals sexual abuse
The headline stopped me in my web-surfing tracks.
“Mets’ Dickey writes he was sexual assault victim.”
Now, I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t follow Major League Baseball all that closely, and I definitely don’t keep tabs on the oft-struggling Mets. But when I saw the last name, I immediately knew the headline was about R.A. Dickey.
And that made my heart sink.
The knuckleball pitcher spent several years with the Oklahoma City RedHawks as he climbed his way through the Texas Rangers’ farm system. I got the chance to know him about as well as any minor-league baseball player who’s come through Oklahoma City, partially because he was here for a longish stretch and partially because he was such a nice guy.
I wrote a story about him back in the spring of 2000. He and fellow pitcher Jonathan Johnson had started a charity called “Honoring the Father” not only to spread their Christian faith but also to network with other professional athletes. They had already done a lot of great work, speaking to all sorts of groups and influencing goodness knows how many people. But they wanted to do even more.
Offseason mission trips with other players topped the list.
I wasn’t surprised, then, when I saw a couple months ago that Dickey had decided to climb Mount Kilimanjaro to raise awareness for human sex trafficking in India.
But until Tuesday morning with the pending release of his memoir “Wherever I Wind Up”, I had no idea of the personal connection that Dickey had to sex crimes.
He was a sexual abuse victim at the hands of two different perpetrators, first by a 13-year-old female babysitter and then by a 17-year-old male. He was only 8 years old when the first incident of abuse happened, and he wrote about some of it in his book.
“The babysitter chucks the pillows and stuffed animals out of the way,” he wrote. “She looks at me and says, Get in the bed. I am confused and afraid. I am trembling. The babysitter has her way with me four or five more times that summer, and into the fall, and each time feels more wicked than the time before. Every time that I know I’m going back over there, the sweat starts to come back. I sit in the front seat of the car, next to my mother, anxiety surging. I never tell her why I am so afraid. I never tell anyone until I am 31 years old.”
The whole thing turned my stomach.
It, like the Penn State scandal, reminded me that there are so many silent victims of sexual abuse. Every time I hear the statistics, it boggles my mind. But still, sometimes it takes something that hits a little closer to home to remind us that those aren’t just numbers. They are people.
But you know what this also reminded me of? That good people can come out of bad situations.
On Tuesday, I re-read that story on Dickey, Johnson and “Honoring the Father”, and one of Dickey’s quotes jumped out at me.
“Something feels good about serving another person,” he said. “When you can give something to somebody who doesn’t have as much as you and impact their life, it feels good.
“The phenomenon is inside every human being.”
Even after all he went through, Dickey believes every person has something good inside them.
I know this much — he has more good than most.
College hoops: Martin was great for K-State
I’ll admit it — I was wrong about Frank Martin.
When Kansas State hired the unknown coach five years ago, I thought it was a desperation hire. The Wildcats had just been dropped by Bob Huggins. He’d excited the fan base in only one season, but after that year, he bolted for his alma mater, West Virginia.
(By the way, I didn’t exactly feel sorry for a school that got bit by Huggins. Hey, you picked up a snake. What did you expect?)
Martin had been Huggins’ assistant for several years, but still, this wasn’t a guy who programs were clamoring to hire.
But what he did in five seasons in Manhattan was big time. The Wildcats’ four appearances in the NCAA Tournament were significant, but more than that, the program returned to relevance under Martin. Prior to his arrival, the Wildcats had become a bottom-half team in the Big 12. Decades of proud tradition had evaporated. Droves of devoted fans had turned away.
It was sad to think of the days of Bob Boozer and Jack Hartman and Lon Kruger and Mitch Richmond, then see how far the Wildcats had fallen.
And yes, I’m a Kansas alum, but when it comes to college hoops, the only thing I cheer is good basketball. And when Martin took over at K-State, good basketball was often in short supply.
Martin changed all of that.
He turned the program around, bringing back the pride and winning back the fans. Bramlage Arena is now known as The Octagon of Doom.
Without Martin, who knows where the Wildcats would be now?
Some folks are fans of his fiery, angry style, but I always loved watching Martin coach. He knew how to get the most out of his players. And you know what? For as angry as he looked on the court, he never seemed that way off of it. He was the anti-Bobby Knight in that regard.
Another reason to like Martin.
He did right by Kansas State. For the sake of basketball in the Big 12, here’s hoping his replacement continues what he started.
