Speaking of basketball, saw these polls on ESPN this week. First, there’s the best college basketball players during the ESPN era poll – the ESPN era beginning in 1980, I believe. There are a few on here that seem to me to be a given. I think there’s no doubt Ralph Sampson, Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing, and Christian Laettner deserve to be on this list. Most of the rest probably do, too. However, I’m not willing to put anyone on this list that played less than 3 years. Kenny Anderson? Alan Iverson? Chris “time-out” Webber? In a list of a only dozen or so players, are these the best they could find? (I would mention Grant Hill’s obvious exclusion, but I’d probably be accused of a Duke bias.)
Then there’s the best coaches of the ESPN era poll. They’re calling it Mount Rushmore here, so they’re asking for the top four. I think two cannot be argued against – Dean Smith and Mike Krzyzewski. A third is pretty strong, too – Bob Knight. However, some would argue that some of his best coaching was in the pre-ESPN era of the 70’s, even though he won two titles in the 80’s. There is some validity to that point, and coupled with his lack of success since the early 90’s, you could argue maybe he doesn’t belong. But he’s still one of the best ever. Outside of them, it’s sort of a toss up. Most everyone else deserves to be on the list for consideration, even though many are obviously not in the top four. But can you seriously put Tubby Smith on this list? Denny Crum deserves it before him. Crum went to three final fours and won two titles in the 80’s, and he did it with his players, not Rick Pitino’s. This was a pretty good list, but whoever suggested Tubby really needs a reality check.
I had a dream last week that Bill Clinton was able to run for President again (apparently, in my dream, the law had been changed.) And, he was going to do so in 2008, and I was considering voting for him. Hillary was very upset because she was planning to run and Bill was ruining everything. I have no idea what this means, but that was my dream.