In Mourning

April 30th, 2009
New York, NY


Good morning public. Sorry for the radio silence, but Mr. Black was in mourning yesterday. The New York Rangers were eliminated in Game Seven, and frankly I didn’t have the heart to write a well thought out piece, and it would have just been angry gibberish aimed at a choice few. Rather than “write angry” I took a day off to enjoy a nice spring New York afternoon.

But the sports world doesn’t stop turning, so I have a ton to catch up on, so getcha popcorn ready. Here we go:

RIP Glenn Gondrezick
Many of you have no idea who this is, but Mr. Black does. Gondrezick played for the Denver Nuggets and New York Knicks in the early- to mid-1980s, and was a 10th man at best. His passing hits me a little harder than most fans, since I had a personal experience with him.

Now, in spite of my fancy ability to write in full, coherent sentences, I didn’t grow up going to a fancy prep school. My school was in a neighborhood that, while not quite dangerous, was definitely not the kind of place an NBA player wants to spend an off evening. But my Catholic League basketball team’s coach somehow knew the Gondrezeck’s and asked Glenn to stop by our practice sometime. Quite randomly on a Wednesday night, he did surprise all of us (including the coach) by stopping by for the last half hour of our practice. He gave a quick talk about hard work, playing hard, winning as a team and the NBA. He then proceeded to give us some tips on shooting form (not that any of us were able to emulate his form), and did a short demonstration.

Being the smart ass kids we were, we decided to count out how many shots he made in a row:

Baseline shot from the corner. Swish. “One.”
Stepping over a foot. Swish. “Two.”
Over one more foot. Swish. “Three.”
Back a foot and over. Hits the back of the rim, up and in. “Four”

And so on and so on. He proceeded to hit 43 straight jumpshots. Now, these weren’t 15-footers, but all between 20-and 24-feet. He just has a rhythm. Shoot, hands up for the pass from coach, set, shoot, swish. It was mesmerizing and for an elementary school kid, 24-feet seemed like a mile away.
At the end of the performance he had gone 47 for 50. At that point I realized two things. First, this guy was better than anyone I’d seen in person. Second, as good as he just showed us he was he could barely get any playing time. So although I played organized sports for another 10 years, I quickly put aside any aspirations of going pro.

He passed away on Monday at 53, of heart failure. He received a heart transplant last fall and apparently, it just didn’t take. As a college player, he was in a Final Four in 1977 and had his number retired at UNLV. As a pro, he was at best a role player but always a fierce competitor and he was the kind of guy who showed inner-city kids how to shoot a basketball. Which in my world gets you a ticket to heaven and a starting spot somewhere.

Gondrezick is survived by a daughter and two sons. Mr. Black’s thoughts and prayers are with you.


New York Rangers Season Wrap Up
The Blueshirts were bounced from the playoffs two nights ago after an amazing start to the series. For those of you not following the series the Rangers jumped out to a big lead and then couldn’t finish it, losing three consecutive series clinchers.

In a way, this series was a lot like the season. Early on, the team overachieved, and the fans started to believe the team was better than it really was. A quick does of reality set in with a tough loss, and the team started to lose confidence and play was inconsistent. Finally, struck by a lack of leadership, the wheels fell off. Pretty much what happened from September to March.

Looking at the season overall, it’s amazing that the team was able to finish as strong as they did and make the playoffs. With Florida, Carolina, Montreal and Pittsburgh finishing strong the team was still able to hold onto a playoff spot and win lots of big games down the stretch. With great play by Henrik, they were able to put a scare into Washington, but in the end Henrik, and the team just ran out of gas.

So taking stock of the past, here are some thoughts on the future.

Keep Tortarella
Coach still has the “interim” tag on his title, but the team would be smart to remove it as soon as possible. Without a true on-ice leader, the team needs his fire and by keeping him they give the team some badly-needed consistency. This is a young team that for the most part responded well to Tortarella, and his style of coaching and forcing players to take responsibility would be good for the team.

The Redden Albatross
The Rangers have another $33 million dollars tied up in Wade Redden over the next five years. Read that again. $33 million, five years. You probably just threw up in your mouth a little if you’re a Rangers fan.

So the theory is that the Rangers are stuck with him. No team will take the contract, and so the team has to be content to let him steal money from them. Even though he showed flashes of decent defensive play in the playoffs, there were enough lapses (including the series-winning goal) that the team should give serious consideration to letting him go. As in release and eat the contract.

The Rangers young defensemen (Staal, Girardi, Mara) really grew up in the playoffs and rather than give Redden more ice time, hand over his powerplay duties to Staal and Mara and call it a day. We can continue to train defensive linemen on the job or hopefully find a free agent bargain. At this point, all Redden does is keep young talent off the ice.

What To Do With The Rentals
Derek Morris and Nick Antropov were rental players. Morris didn’t do much in New York, and I’m not even sure he got off the plane. He was quite invisible in both regular season and playoffs. No need to resign him then.

Antropov needs to get resigned. He’s one of the few players we have who can play around the net. With his size and soft hands, he turned into a good scoring option for the team and was solid no matter who was on his line. When he plays with a mean streak (like in Games Six and Seven) you see the potential for him to be one of the three best players on the team. With Tortarella coaching he might really excel.

Nik Zherdev
In college, I had to take Economics. For some reason, I just couldn’t get my head around the practice, although I knew all the theory inside and out. So when we had weekly quizzes, which were really low pressure and on specialized subjects I always pulled an ‘A.’

Mid-terms and the finals were a different story. With so many different theories and so much coming at me, I’d never get it right. Every big exam was the same story: ‘D-.’ So at the end of the term, I had a ‘C.’ Knowing I was smarter than this I took two more Econ classes with the same result. Awesome grades on quizzes, epic fail on Mid-terms.

Nik Zherdev is economics. The Rangers are me. Cut bait now.

Free Agents
We need a couple decent defensemen and someone that can score. Not much is out there and we have no money. So let’s be careful on this and only sign on player…we need to save money to keep Dubinsky, Callahan and Staal around.


The New Yankee Stadium™
I’m sure you’ve all seen the story. The Yankees announce 50% price cuts on the unsold Legends Seats at the new stadium. It’s nice to see greed bite a franchise in the ass, even if it’s one of my favorites. If you want to know how I feel about the new stadium, read my earlier post.

Even with these seats filled, the Yankees still sold their tradition, and even though it’s early in the season, I feel like the bullpen is too weak to finish better than third in the brutal AL East. Having A-Rod back will hurt more than help, since our only wins are close games, and he’s approximately 0 for life in big situations. Wang seems to be truly damaged which means we lose a stud pitcher.

If we do finish third, here’s what I imagine happening at the Steinbrenner Compound in Tampa, FL.

It’s late October, George, Hank and the family are all seated at the dinner table. It’s the long, ornate table like in bad movies. George and Hank are seated on opposite ends.

George is showing his age, so he’s slightly out of it, hard of hearing and his eyes are squinty.

GEORGE (yelling): Hank! How’s the team doing this week?

HANK (slightly sheepishly): Well, Dad. We we’re not playing. We finished third, I thought I told you.

GEORGE (yelling): What? We’re playing right now and it’s in the third? Let’s put the game on, I love watching my boys! Who are we playing, is it Detroit?

HANK (Louder): No. We’re NOT playing, we finished third in the division.

GEORGE (yelling, in anger) WHAT! How? What happened? This is inexcusable?

HANK (sheepishly) Well, we were a few games out and the Rays were in NY, A-Rod was hitting and it was s quiet in the new Stadium that everyone could hear the Kaballah chants Madonna taught him. Fans started to chuckle and it got in his head. He went 0-44 for the last two weeks of the season. That and we had to pitch Nick Swisher as a set up man. At least his ERA was in single digits.

George throws a glass at Hank, which hits the wall. Brian Cashman comes in to quickly clean it up and replace it. He never makes eye contact with George or Hank.

HANK (panicking now) It’s just that …. Wellthenewstadiumisreallyemptythefansaren’trowdyandballsflyoutallthetime.

GEORGE: DAMMIT! WE MOVED? WE’RE THE NEW YORK FREAKING YANKEES! MOVE THEM BACK TO THE REAL YANKEE STADIUM.

HANK: But Dad, we can’t it will cost….

GEORGE: Cost? Cost? I said WE’RE THE NEW YORK FREAKING YANKEES! YOU’RE FIRED! WE’RE MOVING BACK! CASHMAN! GET ME MY PILLS!!!

Yankees move back and win 115 games and the 2010 pennant. The End.

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