Bad News

K.J. has just been informed that he will need to miss the entire season with concussion-like symptoms after what originally was thought of as a minor injury. During the game against N.W.O last season he rammed his head into the wall and ever since has experienced headaches. After consulting with the doctor it was determined that for the next couple of months he needed to take it easy until they could figure out exactly what was wrong. This is a blow to the team as K.J always provides a solid effort week in and week out and his presence in the locker room will also be missed for the time being. Look for him to return in the fall though assuming everything goes as planned which at this point seems to be a realistic goal.

Summer Session 08' - Game #2

Clip Joint 60 O'Donnel 42

O'Donnel....what can I say about this team? They played hard despite the fact that they lacked any true talent on the their team. Going into the game we found out a couple hours before tip that we were once again going to be short-handed. D.T. was off in O.C. for the weekend and A.H. was busy celebrating a belated b-day at his house. J.P. was still recovering from a loss in the family so he was only 50-50 leading up to game time. So there we were with 6 guys once again this week, minus two of our better players. It really did not make a huge difference other than the winning margin. If we had a full roster I am pretty sure we win this game by 30+ but I suppose I should not get too greedy. We turned the ball over too many times against a defense that was not pressuring us, we just got lazy on some passes. Overall, we struggled at times to score and went through a couple of bad stretches where we simply could not get it in the basket. I mean seriously, we might have shot around 30% as a team for the whole game. We had the lead for the entire game and it varied from as little as 5 points all the way up to the final margin throughout the game. They did some good things inside but that is to be expected when our tallest player was 6-1 or so in the middle. It would have been nice to hold them to less than 40 because we gave them some cheap baskets late in the game when the balance was already decided but what can you do? It is hard to play intense basketball for 40 minutes when you know in your head that your opponent is inferior. Alas, it is also hard for guys to take showing up to games seriously when THEY know that the opposition is most likely not going to beat us. I guess you get a little jaded after 3 straight titles...the regular season while not meaningless is really just a tune up for us as we pretty much are guaranteed a spot in the top 2 at the end of the season. Knowing all that makes it easy sometimes for guys to miss games or play at less than 100% full speed. I'm not sure how you fix that or if it is worth fixing. I guess once we jump to the big leagues next season that should all change because every week will be a challenge.

So 2-0 headed into a bye week for the holiday. We come back against a team who is 1-1 but won via the forfeit last night. They do not scare me much but they do seem to have a couple of decent players and from what I could tell they have a few big bodies so we might get a decent game. I predicted a wider margin before this past game so I am going to be conservative on this one. Taking into consideration that we should have a full team for the next game the final score should be right around 69-51. Yeah that sounds about right...

Comings & Goings

So after all the hype about possible signing B.C. to a deal to play this season I found out yesterday evening shortly before our second game that he will NOT be available. It is funny when you talk to someone about playing and they seem so excited to possibly be a part of the team and then all of the sudden they come up with a half dozen excuses as to why they have to pass on the offer. Whatever. It is what it is. he would have looked good in the middle of the zone but at the end of the day it really is not going to hurt us this season. Not to mention the fact that J.P. manhandled him a few times in practice. We still have one spot available and it might go to another big guy before our third game which is not for almost two weeks. We have some time to make a few offers out there so we shall see if any of them come to fruition.

Free Agent Signing?

Rumor around the league is that we might just go ahead and sign up B.C. to a one year deal with a player option for a second season. I would like to address those rumors and say that we are currently in discussion but nothing has been confirmed yet until Sunday afternoon. If he does sign, we are in really good shape for the remainder of the season. We need his size in the middle on defense and it does not hurt that he can score a little bit too.

The starting line-up for our next game is probably going to look like this:

J.P at center with A.H and J.D on the wings with G.C and M.D at the guard positions. I do not forsee any issues with this unless of course someone shows up after the game starts. A full review of the game will be posted after the weekend.

Quick Sidenote

I am not a very talented writer. So if there are a zillion run on sentances, poor grammar etc.. I know this and am fully aware of my limited vocabulary and poor writing habits. If I was good at it I would be writing million dollar articles for magazines or publishing books or something like that. Take it for what it is.

Summer Session 08' - Game #1

Clip Joint vs. Dynasty:

dy-nas-ty:

In sports, the term dynasty is often used to refer to a team that dominates their sport for a period of time. Such dominance is usually recognized only after a team has won many consecutive championships in a given time. The exact requirements for the label is a frequent topic of debate among sports fans.

Here is the thing about "Dynasty", I love the name but if you choose to call your program as such you probably should have a few championships under your belt. This team has not won any to my knowledge, therefore the name is very misleading. I propose they change their name to one of the following; Possible Dynasty, Hopeful Dynasty, One Day We Could be a Dynasty etc...

Anyway, so going into the season opener we knew we would have a different roster than last season since A.L. decided to make the jump to the pros. Combine that with K.J. deciding to take a season off to rest and travel the world we needed to bring in some extra help. This came in the form of a legitimate all star in G.C. Having played "Dynasty" twice prior and losing both times we knew this would be a challenge, especially since we only had 6 guys in attendance.

Dynasty featured the same players as they had last season except for adding a new big man in the middle who appeared to have somehwat limited skills despite his size. I tend to worry about players just by looking at them and over the years I have talked myself into believing things that simply aren't true. For example, he was built solidly so I figured he would be tough to stop inside and would be on the glass all game long. In addition to said big man they have Peja who is highly skilled at scoring from all places on the court and a guy who can best be described as the ultimate hustle player who scores garbage points.

The game was close the entire way with both teams taking the lead and losing the lead at various points throughout the game. But we were able to get it done down the stretch despite J.D. fouling out with about 5 minutes to go in the game. It probably did not help that we nearly blew the game by turning the ball over a few times late in the game making poor decisions and missing the front end of a 1 and 1 but fortunately we escaped with the win. DT was especially good in this game making a handful of threes and generally being dominant along with a solid first game from GC to lead the way.

1-0 with a game against a team that lost a triple overtime heartbreaker at the buzzer on the horizon. I do not think we will have any trouble dispatching this opponent. I predict something in the neighborhood of 71-48.

Current Team

Below is the current roster for this season.

J "Robo-cop" D.
D "B-Scotch" T.
M "HGH" D.
A "Lights Out" H.
B "B-Weezy" A.
K "Solid" J.
J "Middle-man" P.
J "The Leader" W.
G "Do-it-all" C.

Former Players

Here is a list of former players who have had the honor or in some cases dis-honor of representing the orange and black over the years. (Most names have been changed or nicknames have been used to protect those who are private people). Some of these guys have not officially retired but are on some sort of hiatus.

Jason "The rapper" L. - played for a few seasons in the infant stages of the team

John "Smokestack" - was the first big man ever on the team, had horrible hands

Fred "Shawn Kemp" - guy provided the one and only dunk ever in Clip Joint history

Shawn "The veteran" G. - provided veteran leadership and solid defense for many seasons before eventually retiring without a championship ring.

Andy "Out of Shape" B. - big man who rather shoot jumpers than score inside, ate himself out of the league

Ravi "One -eye open" V. -solid big man who could rebound and block shots and add some scoring, literally could not see from more than 2 feet away

Jerome "church" - dreadlocked guard who came straight from church every week

J.P. "Coach" F. - the most famous of the Clip Joint alum who later became hated rival for several years

Mike "Drunk" - played one season before going into the substance abuse program for the league

"Lotto" - was a solid point guard who played for a pair of seasons but never reached his full potential

Jason "Shoot First" C. - power forward who was more worried about his personal scoring than the teams

Ashish "Shazeezy" K. - one of the original members but fell out of favor with the team and was forced to retire

Danny "Turn-Over Machine" - enigmatic point guard who no-showed too many games, lasted 5 games before being released

Kamaal "Team Player" J. - Was an on again , off again player for many seasons and provided great depth off the bench

James "One Season Wonder" W. - won a title in his only season, was quietly effective

George "Greek League Legend" K. - star point guard for many seasons, still one of the best all time members of the Clip Joint

Jake "Jewspan" G. - big man who could do it all from anywhere on the floor

Andy "All Day" L. - played one season and left a lasting impression as possibly the hardest working player on the team

Historical Information

If I really want to get into the history of this storied program it would probably take me hours upon hours so I will do my best at keeping this as concise as possible. The program started in 2002 as a small group of moderately talented basketball players looking to develop a competitive program in the state of Maryland. Things got off to somewhat or a rocky start with little to no success in competing with many of the better and larger programs. The first few seasons were difficult and the lack of incoming interested players made things hard to improve. The fan base while fiercely loyal, was growing impatient and wanted to see the team do well immediately, not struggle through sub par seasons without making the playoffs. After three seasons it was either build something solid or call it quits and thats when everything changed.

Our ownership began looking outside the box at various players to come and play in hopes of improving the quality of the program. Alot of guys came and went but eventually management was able to procure many talented athletes which in turn made it easier to recruit even more talent. Currently coming off the heels of our third straight championship we are in the midst of obtaining a 4th title in a row and 5 out of the last 6 seasons. Our hopes are to capture one more trophy before making the jump to the highest level of competition in the state. So after suffering through zero playoff appearances in the first 4 seasons of the program and losing our first 3 title games we have rattled off an impressive run which will hopefully lead us to that next level.