MLB: COLORADO ROCKIES, LINING UP  /// NBA: ALL STAR RESULTS

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            “SPORTS NOTEBOOK” posts its columns Tuesday and Friday of every week---Ed. & Publ., Marvin Leibstone.

MLB:     “Who are these guys?” That has to be a common response to the 2012 Colorado Rockies 40-man roster. More than half of the ballplayers listed are “unrecognizable,” to Colorado fans, anyway, the rest being the infielders, outfielders and pitchers who were in multiple games during the 2011 MLB season. 

So, who’s returning? Among infielders, Todd Helton, Jason Giambi, Johnathan Herrera, Troy Tulowitzki and Eric Young, Jr. For the outfield, Charlie Blackmon and Carlos Gonzalez. Among pitchers, Matt Belisle, Rafael Betancourt, Jhoulys Chacin, Juan Nicasio, Esmil Rogers, Alex White. Regarding a catcher, the three candidates for April’s lineup are new: Ramon Hernandez, Eliezer Alfonso, Jordan Pacheco and Wilin Rosario.

Spring training will, of course, determine who will constitute the starting line-up, and which hurlers will be mid-game relievers and closers. This means that a team with more than 25 new players could in April be mostly “the old Rockies,” a selection from the crew of years before, the new additions a catcher who can hit and field above the margin, likely Ramon Hernandez, obtained from the Cincinnati Reds, and at third base, Marco Scutaro, from the Boston Red Sox, and a third outfielder, Michael Cuddyer, from the Minnesota Twins.

New and promising for the Rockies pitching staff will be RHP Jeremy Guthrie, from the Baltimore Orioles, and RHP Guillermo Moscoso, from the Oakland A’s.

Of much value this year will be the Rockies pre-season schedule of games in March, when 11 of 31 challenges will be against teams within the division that the Colorado team hopes to be leading by late September, starting with a game versus the Arizona Diamondbacks on March 3. There will be two more contests vs. the Diamondbacks before April, and two each vs. the San Diego Padres, the Los Angeles Dodgers and the San Francisco Giants. That’s roughly around 40 hours of playing time (equal to an average work week) for Rockies manager Jim Tracy to refine the existing roster and settle on an opening day lineup. Given how often most big league managers revise their line-ups during the regular season, maybe spring training isn’t long enough for any baseball team to ever be more than a work in progress.

*   *   *

NBA:    The West beat the East on Sunday, 152-149, five of its players finishing with double-digit points, the rest of the West’s best accumulating their usual number of assists, rebounds and blocks roughly on par with the East relative to number of minutes that players received on the floor. The Oklahoma City Thunder’s Kevin Durant led the West with 36 points and became the All Star MVP, the L.A. Lakers Kobe Bryant completing with 27 ppg, the L.A. Clippers Blake Griffin with 22 ppg, the Thunder’s Russell Westbrook, 21.

At half time, the West led the East by 18 points, and at the deep end of the fourth period the West was ahead by 21, but the East pushed that down to a single point, unable to go further. Of certainty, the East had shining moments, the Miami Heat’s LeBron James scoring 36 points and the Heat’s Dwyane Wade, 24, the N.Y. Knicks Carmelo Anthony, 17.

Noteworthy is that from start to finish the 2012 All Star game reflected a professionalism not always seen at All Star events, that is, there remained a kind of seriousness without it being somber, no player taking his presence at the game lightly, yet no player being overly dramatic or seeking the camera, no false frivolity. Maybe it was a disappointment for fans who had hoped to see more dazzle from the Clippers Chris Paul, the Boston Celtics Paul Pierce, the Heat’s Chris Bosh, the Dallas Mavericks Dirk Nowitzki and the Phoenix Suns Steve Nash, but overall the NBA showed that it could be a class act and deliver images of the leading edge in basketball skills and how the modern game should be played (Wow, those LeBron three-pointers in the fourth Q, and Wade’s triple-double).

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NBA:  ALL STAR GAME, 2012  //  MLB: COLORADO ROCKIES & IMPACT OF EARLY 2012 GAMES

 For more sports analysis, go to Mile High Sports Radio AM1510 or FM93.7, and to Denver’s best sports blogging team, milehighsports.com

            “SPORTS NOTEBOOK” posts its columns Tuesday and Friday of every week---Ed. & Publ., Marvin Leibstone.

NBA:   On Sunday, February 26, a curtain will lift for the annual NBA All Star game, a mix of hoopla and hoops, one part Grammy and Oscar event, three parts high challenge in that the NBA’s best athletes will attempt to perform together with zero defects and against one another feverishly, a happening since 1951, minus the 1999 NBA lockout.

The All Star event will, of course, suggest which of the two NBA conferences puts up the better fight, though a single game probably isn’t the best indicator for finding that out. And while an award will be handed to an MVP selected from what will likely be less than 30 minutes of his time on the floor, there will be glimpses of who may be the association’s best player at individual skill-sets, for instance, scoring off of regular field goals, 3-pointers and/or lay-ups, and who’s best at passing, rebounding and blocking, again the single competition a less than precise indicator.

Anyway, some background:

From 1951 until year 2000, the Eastern Conference dominated, accumulating more than 30 All Star wins, but from year 2000 until the present it’s been nearly equal.

Since 2000, the West has won the All Star game three years in a row: 2002, ‘03 and ’04, while the East has won two years in a row, 2005 and ’06.

Only two coaches have had winning All Star teams twice since 2000, Phil Jackson (L.A. Lakers) and Stan Van Gundy (Orlando Magic).

Teams represented by an All Star MVP more than once since 2000 are the L.A. Lakers, five times, and the Cleveland Cavaliers twice, also the Philadelphia 76ers, twice.

Four players have been selected as MVP’s more than once since 2000, Allen Iverson (76ers), 2001 and 2005; Kobe Bryant (Lakers), .2002, ’07 and ’09; LeBron James (Cavaliers), 2006 and ’08; Shaquille O’Neal (Lakers), 2000 and ’09, along with Kobe Bryant.

Since 2000, there have been only two “blowouts,” the West beating the East 153-132 in 2007, and the West shellacking the East 146-119, in 2009. During these two games, the Lakers guard Kobe Bryant was the selected as the All Star MVP.

From year 2000 on, and except for 2000 and 2009, the All Star MVP would not be from the franchise that would later win the NBA finals and be crowned the NBA championship team.

Only twice has the All Star winning team won with fewer than 100 points, in 1953 and 1954.

Only in seven of the All Star games since 1951 has the winning team finished with more than 150 points, which occurred twice since 2000 (2003 and ’07)

PROJECTION:  Below find the starting lineups for Sunday’s All Star activity:    

EAST:  Forward Carmelo Anthony, New York Knicks //  Center Dwight Howard, Orlando Magic //  Forward LeBron James, Miami Heat  //  Guard Derrick Rose, Chicago Bulls // Gd. Dwyane Wade, Miami Heat
WEST:  Gd. Kobe Bryant, Lakers  // Ctr. Andrew Bynum, Lakers // Fwd. Kevin Durant, the Thunder // Fwd. Blake Griffin, L.A. Clippers // Gd. Chris Paul, Clippers.
And from reserves of the East, we can expect Chris Bosh (Miami Heat), Paul Pierce (Boston Celtics), Luol Deng (Chicago Bulls), Roy Hibbert (Indiana Pacers), Andre Iguodala (the 76ers), and Deron Williams (New Jersey Nets), and from the West, Russell Westbrook (the Thunder), Dirk Nowitzki (Dallas Mavericks, his 11^th All Star appearance), Steve Nash (Phoenix Suns---Nash is 38 years old, this will be his eighth All Star showing), Tony Parker (San Antonio Spurs), LaMarcus Aldridge (Portland Trail Blazers), Marc Gasol (Memphis Grizzlies).  Rumored: Jeremy Lin (Knicks---presently, Lin’s a selectee for pre-game action).

All told, 16 of the NBA’s 30 franchises will be represented by players during the 2012 All Star game. Oddly, a Division’s second place team is without an All Star player this year---the Denver Nuggets. Yet Division third and fourth place teams have players rostered for Sunday night.
For winning, a lot will depend on who hits the floor when and why, therefore much of the All Star victory will have a great deal to do with “rostering” from start to finish, not just with who starts but also with regard to who comes off the bench, and when. Surely the NBA All Star event is a coach’s game, though it can seem only a showcase for the players.

Coaching for the East will be Tom Thibodeau, head coach, Chicago Bulls, and for the West, Scott Brooks, HC, the Thunder. This website’s take is that proper game entry and right extension of minutes for Bryant, Durant and Westbrook could make the difference for the West, though it may not happen if Anthony, James and Rose are at their best and Howard soars as blockmeister, spurring a high rate of turnovers for the East.

*   *   *

MLB:  The MLB season is less than two months away, and spring training for the Colorado Rockies at Scottsdale, Arizona, has kicked in. Opening day for the new season, for the Rockies anyway, will be April 6 against Houston, but afterward the Rockies will play 13 home games interspersed with eight away-games starting on the ninth, first versus the San Francisco Giants for a three-game series. The stretch until April 30 will also include three-game series vs. the Arizona Diamondbacks, the San Diego Padres and the L.A. Dodgers, the L.A. series ending May 2. A value here is that each of the home games in April will be against a franchise from the same National League division that houses the Rockies, so it’s the Colorado team’s chance to create a big lead by dominating each series, while failing to do so could put the Rockies into a catch-up position hard to escape from.

The intensity of April’s challenges could be the best way for Rockies manager, Jim Tracy, to know the trust that he can place in hurler Jhoulys Chacin as a starter and Rafael Betancourt as a closer instead of the mid-game reliever that he’s been in the past, confirming whatever data Tracy can garner during spring training. And, the Rockies will know by May 2 just where corrections and re-rostering will have to be made for a season that fans hope will be better than the last, which the Rockies finished below .500, at 73-89.

A related question here is, “Will spring training include enough hours for the much-altered and reinforced Rockies to develop sufficiently for the April challenges?”

Other questions beg the early response, among them---

            Could LHP Jorge De La Rosa possibly return to active duty prior to now-reported June, especially if newcomer Jeremy Guthrie fails to be the desired surrogate?

Can Todd Helton prove again that he’s reliable “above the margin,” if not as a long ball hitter as an on-base contributor and still as one of the game’s better first basemen?

             Will C. Ramon Hernandez be the Rockies numero uno catcher for the full season and reach expectations at the plate that former Rockies catchers couldn’t?

            Can Carlos Gonzalez achieve the long ball consistency that he delivered prior to the 2011 season? Could this be prevented by his wrist injury?

            Might Gonzalez and Troy Tulowitzki be all of a mid-roster power-hitting duo that the Rockies will need throughout the 2012 season?

            Which of the other NL-West teams will be the Rockies toughest challenge for a playoff contention?

            Will there be enough talent within the Rockies minor league clubs for big league replacement should primary players accrue injuries or show harmful weaknesses at the plate, in the field, on the mound?

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NBA: Thunder Flattens The Nuggets  // What Causes One NBA Team To Prevail Over Another?

 For more sports analysis, go to Mile High Sports Radio AM1510 or FM93.7, and to Denver’s best sports blogging team, milehighsports.com

            “SPORTS NOTEBOOK” posts its columns Tuesday and Friday of every week---Ed. & Publ., Marvin Leibstone.

NBA:   Down went the Denver Nuggets to the Oklahoma City Thunder on Sunday night, yet it was a gallant drop considering that two of the team’s usual starters, Nene and Danilo Gallinari, were unable to play due to injuries. Still, the Nuggets spurred an early lead against the Thunder and held it through most of the first quarter, and in the second Q the Nuggets managed a 46-32 lead.

Then, boom! the Thunder’s Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook put up 33 points in the first half. At the start of the fourth Q, the Thunder tied the game, 83-83. In the fourth, it was an exchange of field goals, so that a tie existed at the two minute warning, 104-104.

The Nuggets pushed on: 43 seconds to go in the game and they led, 111-106, only to experience a tie and then lose in overtime, during which Kevin Durant got to his career high 51 point game. Final score: Thunder 124, Nuggets118.

The pain of losing can be softened, eased when looking back on a game’s high points, for example, though the main thrust against the Nuggets were the combined 91 points set by Durant and Westbrook, the Nuggets Arron Afflalo accrued 27, Andre Miller, 21, Ty Lawson, 17, and four additional Nuggets ended the game with double digit points, as well. That’s seven Nuggets players scoring in double digits versus the Thunder’s four. Also, the Nuggets had a roughly equal number of assists, blocks and rebounds compared with the Thunder’s. Too, at 17 wins, 15 losses, and though tied with the Portland Trail Blazers, the Nuggets are still in contention for a Northwest Division/Western Conference billet.

But the Nuggets won’t be having it easy in the last days of February. Up ahead are games vs. the San Antonio Spurs, the Los Angeles Clippers, the Trail Blazers, each a top Western Conference team.

NBA: Last week Sports Notebook analyzed most of the losses that the Denver Nuggets have experienced during the current season, concluding that a single cause catalyzing a loss is quite rare. In almost all cases, numerous reasons are responsible for a team’s loss. Anyway, Sports Notebook reported its loss-factor findings on Friday, leading to the question, “What’s behind an NBA team’s wins?”  

Easily guessed is that multiple causes are behind nearly all NBA team victories. Below, then, and to underscore that assumption, is the result of Sports Notebook looking at 12 of the 17 wins accrued by the Nuggets to date, thus a look at such factors as field goal percentage, three-pointer percentage, free throw percentage, number of players finishing with double-digit points per game, number of players surpassing 20 points, also assists, rebounds, blocks.  

Here are major findings---

• Of the 12 Nuggets victories that were examined, 11 included a field goal shooting percentage higher than 42 percent, the highest being 66 percent, three of these wins with field goal percentages of 53, 55 and 59 percent respectively. And, in only three of the 12 wins was the Nuggets field goal percentage lower than that of the opposing team. Also, whenever the Nuggets executed 20 or more assists, the team’s field goal percentage was at, or higher than, 40 percent. Too, during nine games, when the Nuggets scored 100 or more points, the field goal percentage was greater than 40 percent. Yet during five of the 12 wins the Nuggets three pointer shooting percentage was lower than that of the opposing team. In addition, the Nuggets lowest winning score of the year (91 points) included the team’s lowest field goal percentage among the 12 wins (39 percent).
• In four of the 12 wins, the Nuggets free throw percentage was lower than that of the competition, though it was at or higher than 70 percent. Moreover, in three of the 12 wins when the Nuggets field goal percentage was lower than 43 percent, the team’s free throw shooting percentage of 70 percent or higher became a significant advantage.
• During eight of the 12 games, the Nuggets accrued more rebounds than the opposing franchise, with five Nuggets wins having eight or more rebounds, and in the remaining four wins the Nuggets number of rebounds was in no way significantly lower than that of the competition. And in five of the 12 games, the Nuggets had more blocks than the other team, while in the remaining number of Nuggets wins the number of blocks was close enough to that of the opposing team. Also, in six of the 12 games, the Nuggets achieved more steals than the opposing team had, and in the remaining six wins the number of Nuggets steals was in no way significantly less than that of the competition.
• Within only one game did the Nuggets finish with fewer double-digit scorers than the competition had; and in six games the Nuggets matched six opposing players that had double-digit points with six of their own. Too, the Nuggets had more than one player finishing with 20 or more points in only three of the 12 wins.
• Five of the 12 wins were against teams with better records than the Nuggets had at the time of play, each of the five wins with 100 or more points accrued.

From the above, it’s easy to conclude that most wins evolve from multiple factors, and that it may never be the same factors per win. Obvious is the importance of a field goal percentage being higher than 40 %, and that a 40+ field goal percentage usually results from a combination of assists and rebounds, and from the blocks and steals that can lead to turnovers, to fast breaks and therefore shooting opportunities. Too, a majority of wins could include double-digit points achieved by each of five or more players, as opposed to only one or two stars finishing with 20 or more points per game.

Possibly the best lesson from the analysis of the Nuggets losses and wins is that ‘variance” dominates. In other words, you may be able to tell from past games which factors will be more important for winning a basketball game, but you can’t really know which of those factors are going to come together for the next win or the win after that

So, what’s the point here? This: you can’t Moneyball an NBA game accurately past a lot of assumptions, no more than you can Moneyball baseball or any other sport to the nth degree and know all outcomes before they appear, even though assumptions from the process can lead to some positive directions and help create good decisions about plays and who should hit the hardwood and who shouldn’t. Sports will always beat the computer and surprise the heck out of us. Only a portion of sports-info can be a sensible book or an entertaining and instructive movie---the not knowing, the guessing and the hoping has a lot to do with why we love sports, trumping the math game-after-game, win or lose.

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SPORTS NOTEBOOK: NBA: Thunder Flattens The Nuggets // What Causes ...

SPORTS NOTEBOOK: NBA: Thunder Flattens The Nuggets // What Causes ...: NBA: Thunder Flattens The Nuggets // What Causes One NBA Team To Prevail Over Another? For more sports analysis, go to Mile High Sports R...

NBA:   Can We Really Determine Why Any Team Loses Games Frequently?   

 For more sports analysis, go to Mile High Sports Radio AM1510 or FM93.7, and to Denver’s best sports blogging team, milehighsports.com

            “SPORTS NOTEBOOK” HAS RETURNED TO POSTING ITS COLUMNS TUESDAY AND FRIDAY, EVERY WEEK.  Editor/Publisher, Marvin Leibstone.

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NBA:   A second Denver Nuggets loss in February to the Dallas Mavericks, to a team that the Nuggets had beaten on opening day of the current NBA season, it was enough to get Sports Notebook wondering why any NBA franchise with a winning record suddenly falls steeply, for instance, to that 102-84 Nuggets loss to the Mav’s this past week, a top shooting guard (Ty Lawson) finishing with less than three points during 28 minutes of play, a game that had the Nuggets holding as much as a 20 point deficit.

In other words, which combo of categories in NBA basketball causes a team to go belly-up quicker than ice melting over a hot stove?

To mind came the following: lack of field goal attempts, an insufficient number of three pointers, free throws way off, not enough rebounds or blocks or steals, too few assists, low number of players reaching double-digit points per game, not enough players gaining 20 or more points in a single game, and then those factors that are hard to quantify, for example, players out from injuries, weak defense and so not enough turnovers, and there’s the quality of the opposition, in effect, a team being outclassed in spite of having above-the-margin skills and a winning record.

Unable to let go of all this, Sports Notebook examined 12 among the losses that the Nuggets have accrued since the start of the current NBA year, hoping to have clues as to why one NBA team loses to another.

Here are the finds, and note that the data falls into one of three sub-sets: the Not Quantifiable, Defense, and, Offense:

(1) Five of the 12 Nuggets losses went to teams either in first or second place within their conference’s division (Not Quantifiable).

(2) Only four of the Nuggets 12 losses were the second of games scheduled back-to-back (Not quantifiable, though implied is the impact of near-exhaustion among players).

(3) Six of the losses occurred after wins when the Nuggets accumulated 100 points or more during each (Not-quantifiable, maybe the tiredness factor, or over-confidence after a win).

(4)  For four of the 12 losses, a Nuggets top scorer was unable to play because of a recent injury (also, Not-quantifiable).

(5)  Nine losses occurred when the Nuggets FG shooting percentage was lower than that of the opposition (Offense issue).

(6)  Eight losses accrued when the Nuggets three-pointer percentage was lower than that of the opposing team (Offense).

(7) Eight losses happened when the Nuggets failed to have a free throw percentage higher than that of the opposition (Offense).

(8)  When during losses the Nuggets FG percentage was higher than the opposing team’s FG percentage, the Nuggets 3-Pointer and FT percentages were extremely low--- five or more percentiles less than that of the opposing team (Offense). 

(9)  In only five losses have the Nuggets finished with fewer players having double-digit points (Offense).

(10)  The Nuggets failed to provide a shooter with 20 or more points in five of the 12 losses (Offense).

(11) Eight of the 12 losses saw the Nuggets finishing with less than 100 points (Not-quantifiable).

(12) The Nuggets experienced only one loss of 12 when one of its players gained more than 30 points (Offense).

(13) In only four of the 12 losses had the Nuggets fewer assists than the other team (Offense).

(14) In lost games when the FG percentage was higher than that of the opposition, there were more assists than that of the opposition (Offense).

(15) In seven of the 12 losses, the Nuggets had fewer rebounds than the opposition (Defense).

(16) Also in seven of the 12 losses, the Nuggets had fewer blocks than the other team (Defense).

(17) In five of the 12 losses, the Nuggets were unable to match the other team’s number of steals (Defense).

So, what can be distilled from this, leaving us with a few clues as to why an NBA team will lose to an opposing franchise?

Apologies to readers wanting something unique---the surprise from the data above is that it hasn’t offered anything startling, there’s no revelation here about previously hidden reasons as to why a team will lose to another. Into the pool of basketball knowledge is something that anyone can guess after observing only a few NBA games. In the most general of equations, the data offers this: “Weak Defense + Poor Offense (namely, Poor Quality of Shooting) = Failure.”

Yet in a majority of cases (in those 2011/12 losses belonging to the Nuggets, anyway), probably no team loses because of only one or two not-quantifiable, defense and/or offense factors. As reflected in the above data, the number of Not-quantifiable, Defense or Offense reasons for a team’s losses are usually many, a different combo game after game. Clear, however, is that those factors that reside within “the Defense aspects of play,” they affect "the Offense" greatly, e.g., there’s the obvious: a small number of rebounds, blocks and steals result in too few turnovers, the outcome being a low amount of opportunities to initiate fast breaks and then score. Too, low FG, 3-Ptr and FT percentages can occur even with a large number of turnovers and fast breaks, signaling the importance of “shooter-accuracy,” so often the result of smart playmaking, that is, from lots of passing until the right shooter is open against the shot-clock.              

And, the impact of the Not-quantifiable, the factors that cannot be measured accurately, when these factors are unprepared for they can be lethal: not every NBA team has the good fortune to have in reserve a Jeremy Lin who can offset the absence of a Carmelo Anthony.

And, how does a team keep from losing to franchises like the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Dallas Mavericks when the two are sizzling hot with each team-member nearly at career best? This question leads to a bigger one, “What is it that allows one NBA team to prevail over others consistently, reaching the top of its division?” Sports Notebook will examine a dozen or more Nuggets wins, in hope of finding some unique answers? Stay tuned!

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NBA:  THE KNICKS PHENOM, IS IT JEREMY LIN, CARMELO ANTHONY, OR BOTH?  --- DENVER NUGGETS  // WORLD TENNIS: DAVIS CUP.

 For more sports analysis, go to Mile High Sports Radio AM1510 or FM93.7, and to Denver’s best sports blogging team, milehighsports.com

            “SPORTS NOTEBOOK” HAS RETURNED TO POSTING ITS COLUMNS TUESDAY AND FRIDAY EVERY WEEK. Editor/Publisher, Marvin Leibstone.

                                                    

NBA:   The scenario: a losing streak, not of the promise that existed on December 25, 2011, which was opening day of the current NBA season when newcomer to the New York Knicks, Carmelo Anthony, scored enough points for the Knicks to beat the Boston Celtics, 106-104. On that day, super shooter Anthony could hear fans chanting, “Melo, Melo” as they had at Denver---he knew that they were thinking he’d be the Phenom bringing the Knicks to a playoff showing. Responding to date, Anthony has been above the margin during most games played yet producing less than when “back west.” The Knicks are still under .500, at 13-15, in third place of the Eastern Conference’s Atlantic Division, six games behind first place Philadelphia, which isn’t Anthony’s direct fault, it’s that had he met probably overstated expectations the Knicks would be leading the EC.

Then to the hardwood comes Knicks guard, Jeremy Lin. “Stepping up” says it mildly. Lin, recently nominated NBA Eastern Player of the Week, became Anthony-at-Denver "cloned," scoring 109 points over four games, helping to end New York’s six game losing streak with four consecutive wins. During those games, Lin averaged 27 points and eight assists, a remarkable turn the 38 points that he accrued versus the Los Angeles Lakers, a game that the Knicks won, 92-85.

But this isn’t a “Hey, Carmelo, Move Over” scenario, for Anthony leapfrogged over Lin by becoming a leading player of a 113-106 win against the Orlando Magic, scoring 39 points, his best since leaving Denver and a game that put the Knicks where they have wanted to be since beating the Celtics on XMAS Day, anywhere on the way to a playoff billet, even if the leading edge belongs to other teams. Too, Anthony is the only Knicks player to be among the top 10 NBA scorers so far this season, averaging 22.3  points per game, which has included 165 field goals and 134 free throws (as of Sunday).

NUGGETS:   No NBA team wins games forever, and when after a better than modest streak of wins a team loses several, well, the slipping and sliding isn’t going to go on forever, either. Maybe this comment is too soon and too dramatic a way to say that the Denver Nuggets are back after several losses, beating Indiana over the weekend. Now at 16-12, the Nuggets are holding second place in the Northwest Division of the NBA’s Western Conference, behind the Oklahoma City Thunder and two games ahead of the Utah Jazz, and though five games behind the Thunder the Nuggets are tied for fourth place in the WC alongside the L.A. Lakers and Houston.

Tomorrow night, the Nuggets will be challenged at home by the 12-15 Phoenix Suns. But there will be greater challenges---the Nuggets will be facing the Dallas Mavericks on Wednesday, a 17-11 team that beat the Nuggets last week, and they will play the 21-6 Thunder on Sunday, then the 17-8 Clippers on the following Wednesday, next day the 19-9 San Antonio Spurs. The Thunder is leading the WC, the Spurs are second in the WC and leading the WC’s Southwest Division, the Clippers are in third place of the WC, leading the conference’s Pacific Division.

So, again it’s an uphill struggle for the Nuggets, but then none of the teams doing exceptionally well this season can win forever any more than the Nuggets can lose forever.

A disappointment is that no Nuggets player is among today’s top 10 within each of the four major performance categories (scoring, field goal percentage, assists and rebounds), while players from more than 15 other NBA teams have made one or more of the lists. Even so, the team that has the most players showing up on these lists, the Minnesota Timberwolves (13-15), is currently in last place of the WC’s Northwest Division, which may be saying something about star power being of less value than the teamwork exhibited almost constantly by the Nuggets.

WORLD TENNIS:  Round One of the annual Davis Cup competition in world tennis ended over the weekend, Spain beating Kazakhstan, 5-0, Austria whipping Russia, 3-2, France taking Canada down, 4-1, the U.S. beating Switzerland, 5-0, the Czech Republic knocking out Italy, 4-1, Serbia overtaking Sweden, 4-1, Croatia winning against Japan, 3-2, and Argentina walloping Germany, 4-1.

Davis Cup Quarterfinals will occur April 6-8, as follows: Spain against Austria, USA versus France, Czech Republic against Serbia, Croatia vs. Argentina. Semi-finals will be in September, the Finals in November.

Note that Spain left it’s Round One opponent scoreless, while Austria won by a single number, which could indicate Spain’s better chances for a win during the quarterfinals, that is, when we assume that all opponents in Round One were far from weak and behind the competency curve. France and the U.S. won by wide margins during Round One, therefore which will prevail over the other may be anyone’s guess---it’s the same regarding the upcoming Czech/Serbia match, while Argentina could be the wiser bet over Germany.

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NBA:  DALLAS MAVERICKS, DENVER NUGGETS

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            “SPORTS NOTEBOOK” HAS RETURNED TO POSTING ITS COLUMNS TUESDAY AND FRIDAY EVERY WEEK. Editor/Publisher, Marvin Leibstone.

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NBA:   IN any NBA game, there will be hazards, and the job of a coach and his team is to limit them. When one of those hazards is Dallas Mavericks forward, Dirk Nowitzki, suddenly on a roll from playing barely above mediocrity, the task can be uphill all the way, ending, as it had on Wednesday, Mavericks 105, Nuggets, 95.

The Mav’s Nowitzki scored 25 points against a Denver Nuggets team that pushed and pulled weakly not just against him but also versus Dallas guard, Vince Carter, who put up 17 points and eight assists. Yet, while playing below the margin the Nuggets were not in any way “pathetic”---six Nuggets players scored in double-digits, forward Al Harrington and guard Rudy Fernandez gained 17 points apiece, and center/forward Nene and guard Ty Lawson, 16 each.

Mostly the Nuggets were lax on defense against the Mav’s outside kills and the Mav’s shots inside the paint---the Nuggets ended the game with 38 rebounds, the Mavericks, 46. Also, key Nuggets players were unable to contribute: forward Danilo Gallinari and center Timofey Mozgov were sidelined from ankle sprains. Gallinari is, to date, the Nuggets top shooter, averaging 17 points per game, with 30 steals to his credit. Mozgov’s the Nuggets block artist---25, as of Tuesday.

Wednesday’s Nuggets loss could be construed as understandable because of the absence of Gallinari and Mozgov, and that it’s a grueling 66-game season loaded with back-to-back challenges. The Nuggets were challenged by the Mav’s after playing three games straight, losing to the L.A. Lakers, Portland and Houston, the team’s first three-game losing streak of the year, a debilitating fallback from the team’s 13 wins since January 1, which included six consecutive victories (five on the road).

Last year, the Mav’s became the NBA’s championship team. By beating them during opening day of the current season, 115-93, the Denver franchise showed that it could be formidable during and beyond a regular season. And, the Nuggets kept proving it, beating head-of-the-class teams---the Philadelphia 76ers, the L.A. Clippers and the Miami Heat. For the Mav’s, beating the Nuggets on Wednesday signaled a possible return to the stature taken down a rung by an intrepid post-Carmelo Anthony/Chauncey Billups Nuggets.

On entering the versus Mav’s game on Wednesday, the Nuggets appeared to be the better franchise, and it still seems that way, for example, before Wednesday night the Nuggets at 15-10 were not only in second place of the Western Conference’s Northwest Division and tied with the L.A. Clippers for third place in the WC; they had proved to be more of an across-the-roster/teamwork-oriented franchise than the Mav’s, that is, the Mav’s have been more of an organization that relies upon a super star, Nowitzki, now averaging 17.2 points per game (for the Nowitzki of last season, sub-par). A stark reflection of this fact about the Nuggets is the wide spread of assists performed by them, and that this year the Denver team is 8-1 among all games whenever 25 or more of their assists have occurred, while the Mav’s assists haven’t been the extra-zing for their winning record.

Moreover, the Nuggets have had nine players with double-digit assists, two of them having accrued “triple-digit” assists, the Mav’s having eight players with more than 10 each but no player having hit the triple-digit mark. As to total number of Nuggets assists, by Wednesday the team accrued 584, the Mav’s, 527.

Also prior to Wednesday, six Nuggets players had double-digit ppg averages, last year’s championship team had four, with the current Nuggets total ppg being 104, the Mav’s, 93.

With regard to total number of successful field goals for the NBA season thus far, the Nuggets, by Wednesday, had 952, the Mav’s, 884. And, until Wednesday, the Mav’s were ahead of the Nuggets re. three-pointers by only a single digit---170 against the Nuggets having 169. However, 54 of the Mav’s successful three-pointers were Nowitzki’s. Regarding defensive rebounds, the Nuggets had 827 before Wednesday night’s game, the Mav’s, 815.

So, from a comparison of current Nuggets data with that of the Mavericks (an NBA championship team not doing as well as last year but still above the margin and in playoff contention) there's evidence that the Nuggets are among the season’s top teams, that the Nuggets recent four-game drop could be at the curve of a fast U-turn back up. Too bad a crimped NBA season couldn’t, like the shortened NFL year, include a Bye week.

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NFL:  NEW YORK GIANTS WIN SUPER BOWL XLVI  

For more sports analysis, go to Mile High Sports Radio AM1510 or FM93.7, and to Denver’s best sports blogging team, milehighsports.com

            “SPORTS NOTEBOOK” HAS RETURNED TO POSTING ITS COLUMNS TUESDAY AND FRIDAY EVERY WEEK. Editor/Publisher, Marvin Leibstone.

NFL:    New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning’s completed passes to receivers Hakeem Nicks and Marion Manningham, and the Giants pass rush, proved too much for the New England Patriots defense and the Patriots offense, in spite of New England dominating the first half of Super Bowl XLVI, and  starting the game’s fourth quarter ahead, 17-15.

In the fourth Q, a Brady throw was dropped by an open receiver, which could have led to a game-winning TD, even with the Giants TD that happened with less than one minute to final, the Giants soon being handed the Lombardi trophy and crowned the year’s Super Bowl champion, final: 21-17.

Yes, Eli Manning proved that he is an elite QB, and after the fourth Q’s New York TD, with less than 40 seconds of play to go, QB Brady fired some of the longest and nearly complete “desperation passes” of any Super Bowl to date---it wasn’t to be over for the Patriots until it was over, New England again a valiant “we almost made it’’ team, having been to four Super Bowls and losing at each.

But the magic of a Super Bowl competition includes lessons to be learned by NFL teams that during the regular season were playoff contenders, or that made the playoffs and were eliminated in a first round. What did Super Bowl XLVI deliver for these franchises? What were the game winning advantages either team displayed?

For starters, Brady and Manning were certainly adept at seeking and finding the best available options when a play in mind couldn’t possibly work---they mixed it up, threw long, short, handed the football off, didn’t seem to force pre-planned plays against sudden limitations, which emphasizes need for fast-thinking situation-based QB innovation over the pre-set/never-to-be dumped tactic.

Not new knowledge for any NFL team, if the successful pass rush doesn’t win a game, it surely keeps an opposing offense from causing a blowout; it reduces a QB’s options considerably, gets him off his timing, while increasing sack probability. Turning this around, pass protection is key for an effective offense. Significant, however, is that throughout Super Bowl XLVI both the Giants and the Patriots were cagey in the pass rush, using open space to draw a QB or a running back forward where sudden tackling or ball interference could occur. Also demonstrated was the value of speed over strength for linemen responsible for pass protection.

Noted, too, was what could aptly be called “minimum offset,” that is, we didn’t see the Giants or the Patriots continue to sacrifice a particular element of their defense squads so that another element could be reinforced, there was very little double-teaming for coverage of an offense’s wide receiver by thinning a line of defenders needed for forward edges of the pass rush. Doing so usually feeds the opposing offense with additional pass and run options.

Moreover, key to keeping an opposing team from fourth Q scoring is the deployment of a secondary capable of reading a wide receiver’s maneuvering quickly enough to interfere, and  being fast enough to do so, an advantage that the Giants seemed to have over the Patriots during fourth Q play.

It was thought that the team executing the better pass rush would be the winning team, but Manning and Brady were both able to escape and evade enough to discover multiple options for getting rid of the football. This turned the screw for both the Giants and the Patriots, in that quarterback-receiver connectivity became the game’s imperative and its win factor. Some of Brady’s incomplete passes should have, could have been otherwise, leading to game-winning points, and it was the Manning throws caught by receivers that pulled the Giants ahead and made them the NFL season’s championship team.

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NFL:  SUPER BOWL XLVI

For more sports analysis, go to Mile High Sports Radio AM1510 or FM93.7, and to Denver’s best sports blogging team, milehighsports.com

            “SPORTS NOTEBOOK” HAS RETURNED TO POSTING ITS COLUMNS TUESDAY AND FRIDAY EVERY WEEK. Editor/Publisher, Marvin Leibstone.

NFL:  The New York Giants can brag about being victorious at three Super Bowls, so can the New England Patriots. The Giants took home trophy and rings in 1987, 1991 and 2008, the Patriots in 2002, 2004 and 2005.

Other franchises dominating a Super Bowl three or more times are the Green Bay Packers, the Pittsburgh Steelers, the Dallas Cowboys and the San Francisco 49ers, while New England has had the distinction of having won the Super Bowl two years straight, so, too, the Steelers in 1975 + ’76 and again in 1979 + ’80, also the 49ers in 1989 + ’90, the Cowboys in 1993 + ’94, and the Denver Broncos, 1998 + ’99.   

A more up to date and cogent fact related to Sunday’s Super Bowl XLVI, is that the quarterbacks facing one another have been Super Bowl MVP’s---the Patriots Tom Brady for Super Bowl IIIVI (2002) and again for Super Bowl IIIVIII (2004), and the Giants Eli Manning for Super Bowl XLII (2008).

BUT---the Giants have not been to the Super Bowl three additional visits “only to lose,” while the Patriots lost at the Super Bowl in 1986 to Chicago, in 1997 to Green Bay, and in 2008 to the team that they will be facing on Sunday, February 5, 2012, at Indianapolis. In the first quarter of that 2008 event, the Giants led 3-0, and in the second quarter the Giants succumbed to a Patriots touchdown, score 7-3 (NE). Then the Giants recovered in the fourth quarter, leading 10-3, only to be behind again from successful Patriot drives, which was temporary fallback---the Giants pulled ahead again, winning 17-14. While today’s Giants and Patriots are different in skills, strength and style from how they were for the 2008 Super Bowl, it isn’t by enough to say there won’t be a replay of 2008.

Yet New England could prevent a repeat of 2008 by protecting QB Brady in the pocket and keeping his line of sight free for throws to his go-to-guys, doing this with firm and heated determination for neutralizing the Giants pass rush and by keeping the Giants secondary from blocks, tackles, pass interference and interceptions, in effect, by utilizing fast anti-sack and pass protection within and throughout the greater Patriots forward-moving offense. Yes, we are talking "Football-101," the basics, yet easier said than done, for New York’s defenders have their way of being like runaway railcars moving at Mach-2 speed.

During the recent NFL playoffs, Brady completed 48 of 78 passes and was rarely sacked, which shows that the protection that he needs for getting the ball to receivers Rob Gronkowski and Aaron Hernandez (they ran for 232 and 121 yards respectively during the playoffs) could be available on Sunday. Also, during the playoffs, Gronkowski ran for three touchdowns, Hernandez for one—Brady/receiver connects are usually flawless.

Key, then, for the Giants, will be to ratchet up their pass rush and their defense tactics versus the Patriot’s receivers, especially vs. Gronkowski and Hernandez.

Not that the Giants QB Manning doesn’t have his go-to-guys---during the playoffs, Manning completed 76 of 123 passes, with receivers Hakeem Nicks running for 335 yards and four TD’s, Victor Cruz for 244 yards, and M. Manningham 116 yards for three TD’s.

It’s likely, then, that the Giants and the Patriots will employ similar strategies, emphasis on the pass rush and on neutralizing the opposition’s better receivers.      

Which team will dominate and take home the NFL’s Lombardi trophy on Sunday? Our take is that it’s anyone’s guess, with likelihood that neither will win by a wide margin. It won’t be like the Giants whipping a recent Super Bowl winner, the New Orleans Saints, 49-24, during the 2011 regular season; nor will it be like the Patriots playoff victory over the Denver Broncos, 45-10.

A comparison of playoff data puts the Giants and the Patriots almost neck-and-neck, for instance, during the last two of three playoff games that the Giants won, New York accrued 57 points, while from the only two playoff games that the Patriots participated in and won, 68 points were attained. Too, Manning’s pass completion record reached 61.8 percent, while Brady hit 68.5 percent. And, the Giants and Patriots rushed for a similar number of yards, the Giants for more than 300 from its three games, and the Patriots under 300 from its two games, but not by much. 

All this said, an informal survey of top football analysts and major sports media would have the Giants ahead, the conservative guess by three, the higher probability being by seven, both numbers from belief that the Giants pass rush will limit Brady’s ability to connect enough with his favored receivers. Does this take into consideration the fluke? We’ve seen it happen, the fumble, maybe an interception, one or the other resulting in the unexpected TD, maybe a 31-24 finish, N.Y. the winner---no, New England the winner, no, N.Y .  .  . 

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