MySports Today

The Cleveland Cavaliers will host the Orlando Magic in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference Finals on Friday night in Cleveland.  The game will start at 8:30PM EST and will be televised on TNT.

The Magic stole Game 1 of the series with the 107-106 upset win in Cleveland on Tuesday night.  It was the 1st loss for the Cavs in the 2008-9 NBA playoffs.  Dwight Howard led the Magic with 30 points and 13 rebounds, but it was the play of role players that helped lead the Magic to victory.  Rashard Lewis knocked down 22 points and grabbed 7 rebounds.  While Hedo Turkoglu scored 15 points and dished out a game-high 14 assists.

The Cavs focused too much on Lebron James who came through all night long – 49 points, 6 rebounds and 8 assists.  Delonte West had only 6 assists, however, and the team will have to have a more balanced attack if they expect to even the series tonight.  We’ll keep you posted…

The Twins defeated the White Sox 20-1 on their home turf on Thursday afternoon.  It matched the most lopsided loss in White Sox history – the White Sox lost 19-0 against the Angels in Anaheim back in 2002.

Bartolo Colon took the loss for the White Sox – lasting only 2 innigs.  He gave up 8 runs, although to his defense, the 7 runs in the 2nd inning were all unearned after a Wilson Betemit error kept the inning alive.  The White Sox bullpen did not do much better.  Lance Broadway pitched 3 1/3 innings giving up 5 earned runs on 7 hits.  Jason Gobble lasted only 1 inning giving up 6 earned runs on 5 hits.

The Twins teed off and put up some amazing numbers.  The Twins scored in every inning except for the 5th, 8th and 9th innings.  The Twins had a 7-run 2nd inning, a 6-run 6th inning and a 4-run 7th inning.  The Twins pounded out 20 hits.  Michael Cuddyer had 4 hits for the Twins – he was 4 for 6 with 4 RBI and 3 runs scored.  4 other Twins had 3 hits each.  Some other notables:  Joe Mauer went 3 fo4 with 6 RBI’s and 2 runs scored including a grand slam.  Former White Sox 3rd baseman Joe Crede went 1 for 6 but had a 2-run home run against his former club. 

The French Open is set to start on Monday, May 25, 2009 at Roland Garros in Paris, France.  The seeds have yet to come out yet, but I’d like to see Daniela Hantuchova as a #1 seed in one for the 4 women’s brackets.  What do you think?…

It looked like the Mets were going to pull off the upset against the best team in the NL on their home turf, but just like that, the Ryan Church was called out on an appeal play at 3rd base in the top of the 11th ining and the Mets defense deserted reliever Brian Stokes in the bottom of the inning to cost the team the win.

Top of the 11th – With 2 outs Ryan Church singled to left field and appeared to score on Angel Pagan’s triple to the give the Mets the 3-2 lead.  However, Dodgers Manager Joe Torre appealed the play and the 3rd base umpire called Church out for failing to touch 3rd base.  Not good.

Bottom of the 11th – Brian Stokes issued the dreaded lead off walk to Mark Loretta.  Xavier Paul then reached on an erros when Pagan interfered with center fielder’s Carlos Beltran’s view of the ball on a routine fly ball – 2nd and 3rd nobody out.  Not good.  Manager Jerry Manuel ordered the intentional walk to Juan Pierre and Stokes induced Rafael Furcal into a short flyball out to left field.  When Orlando Hudson hit a weak groundball to 1st baseman Jeremy Reed, it looked like the Mets would get out of the inning, but Reed threw a horrible ball towards home plate and Loretta scored with the winning run.

After beating the Giants on the 1st 3 games of this 7 game road trip, the Mets lost the finale to the Giants on Sunday and the 1st game of the 3-game set in L.A.  The Mets will rely on John Maine and Livan Hernandez to try to salvage the last 2 games of the L.A. series.

The NBA Conference Finals are finally set – the Denver Nuggets (Carmelo Anthony and Chauncey Billups) v. the Los Angeles Lakers (Kobe Bryant) and the Orlando Magic (Dwight Howard) v. the Cleveland Cavaliers (Lebron James).

Both Game 7’s on Sunday were disappointing lopsided victories for the Lakers and Magic.  The Lakers rushed out to a 51-31 halftime lead and never let off the gas pedal, cruising to a 89-70 win.  Pau Gasol had a monster double-double – 21 points and 18 boards, while Kobe Bryant scored 14 points, grabbed 7 rebounds and dished out 5 assists.

The Magic led the Celtics by 7 at halftime and 5 at the end of the 3 quarters, and most felt that the final collapse would occur in the 4th quarter as it had so many times this post-season.  The Magic, however, answered the call, crushing the Celtics 35-21 in the 4th quarter to run away with a 101-82 victory in Boston.  Hedo Turkoglu knocked in 25 points, while Dwight Howard finished with 12 points and 16 rebounds.  Ray Allen led the Celtics with 23 points, while Rajon Rondo had a solid game with 10 points, 10 assists and 6 boards.  But Paul Pierce only scored 16 points and Glen “Big Baby” Davis socred 13 points and grabbed only 4 rebounds.

The Nuggets play against the Lakers at the Staples Center in Los Angeles on Tuesday night at 9PM Eastern Standard Time.  The game will be televised on ESPN.   The Magic play against the Cavaliers at the Quicken Loans Center in Cleveland on Wednesday night at 8:30PM Eastern Standard Time.  The game will be televised on TNT.

The Yankees are glad to have A-Rod back.  A-Rod delivered a game-ending walk-off home run in the bottom of the 11th inning on Saturday afternoon to give the Yankees a 6-4 win over the Twins.  It was the 2nd game in a row in which the Yankees had a walk-off hit to end the game – Melky Cabrera’s single in the bottom of the 9th inning on Friday night off closer Joe Nathan gave the Yankees the come-from-behind 5-4 win.

The Yankees led for most of the game until the Twins took a 4-3 lead in the 8th on a Justin Morneau HR and a Brian Brescher RBI double.  But the Yankees came right back in the bottom of the inning on Mark Teixeira’s RBI single.  Teixeira was 4 for 4 on the day with a HR, 4 RBI’s and 2 runs scored.  In the 11th inning, Teixeira struck again – this time with a lead off walk from Craig Breslow.  A-Rod then finished Breslow off with his cruching 2-run HR to deep left field.  Mariano worked 2 scoreless innings in the 9th and 10th, and Alfredo Aceves picked up his 1st win of the 2009 campaign with a scoreless top of the 11th inning.

The Yankees have won 4 straight games and are now 19-17 on the season.  The Yankees trail the 1st place Toronto Blue Jays by 4.5 games in the AL East and go for the sweep of the Twins on Sunday with A.J. Burnett on the bump.

It did not look good.  The Mets trailed the Giants and reigning Cy Young Award-winner 5-1 heading into the 6th inning.

The Mets have won 8 of their last 10 games and have opened up a 2-game lead over the Phillies and Braves in the NL East race.  Lets Go Mets!!!

It’s May 15th.

It’s 50 degrees and raining in Chicago.

Will we ever see the sun and 80 degrees before July?

Probably not, but at least we can look forward to another great season of women’s volleyball.  Ana Paula Mancino is one of my favorite.  Enjoy…

I know this is a stretch, but I’m going to argue that competing for the Miss USA Pageant is a sport – just so we can throw some of these pictures of Carrie Prejean on the blog.  I love how Donald Trumop had to get involved to say that Ms. Prejean would keep her title of Miss California.  And I love how that prompted Shanna Moakler – Miss California Pageant Director – to resign her post.  Where is Jesse Jackson? Where is Rush Limbagh?  Where is the Reverend Al Sharpton?  Where is Lou Dobbs?  Why hasn’t Governor Arnold gotten involved yet?  We need to get a few more celebrities involved in this…

While the action on the NBA hardcourt has been great during the 2008-9 NBA playoffs, some off-court actions are taking center stage these days.

First – Mark Cuban – After the Denver Nuggets defeated the Dallas Mavericks on Saturday with a controversial no-foul-call finish, a fan reportedly called the Nuggets a bunch of “thugs”.  Mavericks owner Mark Cuban then looked at the mother (Lydia Moore) of Nuggets forward Kenyon Martin and told her “that includes your son.”  For an owner of a professional sports team to make a comment like this to a fan is a joke.  Cuban did later apologive to Martin’s mother in a post on his blog, but he did not attempt to apologize to her or to Martin during Monday night’s Mavs win over the Nuggets in Dallas.  In his “An Apology to Kenyon Martin’s Mom” post, Cuban did say that he should not have made those comments to Martin’s mother, but that the whole thing has gotten blown out of proportion.  Whatever…

Second – Glen “Big Baby” Davis – After Davis hit the game-winning jumper in Sunday’s 95-94 Celtics win over the Magic, Davis started celebrating and didn’t see a 12-year old standing near his courtside seats right on the court.  As Davis ran towards the Celtics bench, he bumped the young fan in the back and as the boy took a half step back his hat fell off.  The Boy’s father – Ernest Provetti – wrote a letter to the NBA demanding an apology from Davis and the Celtics.  Provett stated that Davis had “no regard for fans’ personal safety”.  Davis had this to say about the incident:  “If I’ve hurt anybody or I’ve done any harm to anybody, please forgive me because my intentions were just harmless.  Davis went on to say that if he knew that he had bumped the young man, he would have gone up to him and tried to apologize to him or make him feel better.  Guess what Mr. Provetti – when you sit in courtside seats, there is a good chance that a player could fall into your seats at some poitn during the game going after a loose ball or trying to make a play.  If you are worried that you or your son might get injured in those courtside seats – don’t sit there!  Plain and simple.

Third – Carmelo Anthony – His girlfriend – La La Vazquez – was caight on video struggling with an arena security guard during Game 4 of the Mavericks-Nuggets series in Dallas.  It is believed that the altercation started when Vazquez started fighting with nearby rowdy Mavs fans.  Vazquez was escorted from her seat.  Check out the Vazquez video here and no word yet on whether or not she will be allowed to enter the arena if the Nuggets have to return for a Game 6 in Dallas.