Got a fantasy team? Well I got some names for you!

Throughout my years of playing fantasy sports I have gone through quite a few team names. With this seasons football team I just created, my total is now at a solid 50 teams in 4 years. Thats a lot, I know, most of which came in 2007 when I had my single year record of 18 teams ranging from baseball, basketball, football, March Madness, and even a golf team in there. Golf isn’t any fun, don’t play it. Anyway, for this post I would like to divulge you, my audience, with some of the names I have given my teams. Most I think of on my own, some I gather from outside, but since the start of last football season I have vowed never to have the same name twice!

In the spirit of the season, the lists must begin with baseball names. In years past I’ve had Cook’s Crushers, DC’s Beasties, and even stooped as low as VUSC Lions. However, this season brings out the true creative, and fun nature of fantasy sports. My current team name is LinceCUM in my pants. A parody of the SNL short “Jizz in my pants” and last years AL Cy Young winner Tim Lincecum.

– Other favorite baseball team names are: Angels and Damons, The Good, the Vlad, and the Uggla, Scared Pitchless, Easton Fections, Multiple Scoregasms, and finally, Beaten with the Uggla stick. I know there were two Dan Uggla references, but be happy, there could have been so many more.

Moving onto Americas favorite fantasy sport, football. It is estimated that roughly 22% of males in America between the ages of 18 and 49 have at least one fantasy football team. That comes out to about 27 MILLION men, and thats not even taking into account those who have multiple teams, like myself (3 so far). Football is a bit easier to make up names for because there are more high profile athletes in the NFL compared to the MLB. Last season my name offering was a self-created idea that I thought was not to harsh, yet got the point across: Kiss my ASStroturf.

– My list to choose from for this year include; I’m Romo-sexual, I just Witten my pants, Marions Barbarians, Addai another day, and Plaxicos Ammo. The one I settled on is a bit on the “Not PC” side of things, but it’s clever I think, and I mean no insult with it, of course: 1st Downs Syndrome

Onto my personal favorite, basketball. Basketball has even more big names than football, and has smaller squads, which makes the players the most recognizable athletes in America. With so many international players and a fresh batch of rookies coming into the league, the possibilities are almost endless. This list will be a bit longer than the rest because as stated before, it’s my favorite, and I have thought long and hard about them. 

– Farmar‘s Market, Puff the Magic Johnson, Boom Boom Pau, the Bosh pit, Derek Fisher of men, And Thabeet goes on…, Lamar Scrotum, Pietrus and Cream, Bynum-ite!, Medi-Okur, Wade a minute, You’re a Dirk!, I’m just Kidd-ing around, LA Clippers Blake Griffins, and my favorite with the help of a top 15 draft pick… with a side of Curry!

There you have it folks, that should be enough usable names to get you through a few seasons. You can use any you want, just let me know in a comment who you are and which name you used, just out of curiosity!

The (Magic) show must go on!

The Orlando Magic suffered probably the most demoralizing defeat of their young teams blossoming careers last night when they lost in overtime to the Los Angeles Lakers. Though they are heavy underdogs in every point spread out there, the Magic have redeemed themselves after a 25 point blow-out in game one by keeping it close and losing in overtime on after a failed over zealous alley-oop attempt with 0.6 seconds left in regulation. That play, as easy as it may have seemed on TV, is more difficult than at first thought. You try making a running alley-oop lay up with just enough time to tap it, all while in the air being guard by a man who is seven inches taller than you. Just sit here and imagine that for a minute…yeah, that’s what I thought.

I cannot comment on the majority of the game seeing as how I only watched the last 0.6 seconds of the fourth quarter and all of the overtime period, but never underestimate the knowledge you can gain from a box score.

Last nights box score tells me that, once again, Rafer Alston we under utilized in favor of Stan Van Gundy’s twisted thought process. J.J. Redick, the same player who averaged just over 15 minutes per game in the regular season, not including 18 games he didn’t even see playing time in, managed more minutes than the proven veteran point guard the Magic traded for to replace the injured Jameer Nelson. Redick isn’t the lights out shooter he was at Duke, nor is he even remotely good on defense, so why would he, and rookie teammate Courtney Lee, be on the floor for the final ticks in regulation, and most of overtime?

The fact that the final play was an alley-oop to an undrafted rookie shooting guard instead of your all-star monster center Dwight Howard who can literally leap tall building, is beyond my comprehension. Even if Van Gundy’s thought was, “Well, they’ll be looking for the pass to Dwight,” that’s a risk I would take 10 out of 10 times. I would  tell the Lakers the exact play I drew up and personally challenge Gasol, Bynum, and Odom to stop Dwight without fouling him. Honestly, I don’t know if Stan Van Gundy is an idiot or a genius, and that may stay a mystery to me for a long time, but I know which way I’m leaning towards right now…

However, with all that said, I still believe the Magic will drag this series out to seven games. Three straight isn’t that hard against the Lakers when they are on the road, and the Lakers don’t exactly play well in Orlando as of late. And might I add that I was right in my previous post. My X-factor, Rashard Lewis, had an exceptional game last night and the Magic nearly won. That loss had nothing to do with Lewis.

Reluctantly, I must give the Lakers their dues. Hitting 16 of 16 free throws at one point not only helps your team in obvious ways, but it is so demoralizing to see as an opponent, that no matter what you do to try and stop them, you just can’t. And although the Lakers were out rebounded by nine, that was completely nullified by the fact that the Lakers had seven more steals, some directly after those rebounds.

All in all, no matter who you root for you know that this series is going to be a good one, whether it be four or seven games, or something in between. These teams will not quit, Superman and Batman won’t let them.

The NBA Finals: Amazing will happen!

(In a very monotone mumble) It’s amazing, so amazing, so amazing, so amazing, it’s amazing…

I don’t know how David Stern did it, but somehow he managed to get one of Kanye West’s THE worst songs ever made, into a number one hit in just a few weeks, but I digress…

Welcome to the inaugural posting of “D way i C it”…still working on the title. Anyway, the obvious topic of this post must be the NBA Playoffs which begin tonight. Everyone knows that the only way for any self respecting sports writer to gain respect or credibility in this field is not through investigative stories or exclusive interviews, but by predictions, and they have to be right!

For me, it is simply, and painfully put: Lakers in 7

For those of you who don’t know me, I hate the Lakers, and more specifically, Kobe Bryant, with a fiery passion. Don’t get me wrong, I respect him as a player and competitor, but there is just something about him as a person I can’t get past. Maybe it is the Colorado incident, maybe it’s the fact that he is allowed to elbow other players in the face at will, or maybe it’s because he is #24 (“One over Jordan” if I may quote Kanye again). With that said, you can understand how hard it must have been for me to choose the Lakers to win it all.

I came to this conclusion after laying in bed for hours Tuesday night trying to think of a way the Magic could win, but there is none. Rashard Lewis is my X-Factor in this series. Kobe will get his 25-40 a night, and Dwight will get atleast three 20-20 games cause Pau and Bynum combined can’t guard him. Lewis (6’10” 230 lbs.) on the other hand, is to big for Ariza (6’8″, 210 lbs.) to guard, and to fast for Odom (6’11” 245 lbs.) to guard. 

Lewis however, has no answer for what the Celtics and The Media have done to Kobe in the past year. If Kobe doesn’t win this championship, he will go down in history as the single biggest underachiever ever! “Can’t win without a big man/Shaq,” they’ll say. “Doesn’t trust his teammates,” they’ll write. “More focused on his own legacy and stats rather than the teams performance,” they’ll accuse. And he won’t be able to deny any of them. This post is proof of everything I just said too. I’m not talking about the Lakers, I’m talking about Kobe, because that’s all that will truly matter after that fourth W is tallied, no matter which team claims it.

Obviously I believe the Magic have what it takes to steal this series though, given the opportunity. It’s very hard to take a series to 7 games and not have a chance, but it’s not impossible (see round 2 verse the Rockets…7 games, but the Rockets never had a prayer). It’s just too hard to pick a 3-point shooting team over such a well-rounded, deep team like the Lakers.

Well, this is where I end this introductory post, sometimes I forget that other people read this and I need to stop myself before I begin to ramble (to badly). Comments, questions, agree, disagree…LET ME KNOW!!! I’m here for you! There is nothing I love more in life than debating sports with people, so comment on here and let me know what you want me to talk about next post! Thanks for reading!

Daniel J Cook

P.S. It IS ok that LeBron didn’t shake hands or talk to the media. Just cause he’s the face of the Cavs/NBA/all that is right in the world doesn’t mean he’s not allowed to be upset!