NBA--Playoffs, 2013/14; Denver Nuggets, a Wrap // MLB: April Soundings // Motor Sports: Formula 1

sports-notebook.blogspot.com . . . FOR MORE 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 each week. Ed., Publ., Marvin Leibstone; Copy & Mng. Ed., Gail Kleiner . . . // NBA--Playoffs-2013/14; Denver Nuggets, a Wrap // MLB—April Soundings // Motor Sports, Formula 1. . . // NBA—NOT completely the same year over again but there is a definite stream of similarities between last year’s NBA playoffs and what as of yesterday is the NBA-2013/14 post-season card, in that 11 of the 16 franchises making the about-to-be post-season were also slotted for NBA-2012/13, six from the NBA West, among them, the Oklahoma City Thunder, San Antonio Spurs, L.A. Clippers, Houston Rockets, Memphis Grizzlies and Golden State Warriors, and five from the NBA East---Miami Heat, Indiana Pacers, Brooklyn Nets, Atlanta Hawks and Chicago Bulls. Added for playoffs this year are surprise takers, the East’s Southeast Washington Wizards and the Charlotte Bobcats, which hit bottom during NBA-2012/13, and failing to meet expectations for 2013/14 post-season repeats are the West’s L.A. Lakers, Denver Nuggets, the East’s N.Y. Knicks, Boston Celtics and the Milwaukee Bucks. Unable to make the playoffs last year, and contenders within the current line-up, are the West’s Portland Trail Blazers and the East’s Toronto Raptors. Best of the West now are the Spurs with their 62 wins, best from the East the Indiana Pacers, 56 wins. Of the eight teams now listed for the year’s playoffs, all have won 50 and more games. Of the East’s eight, five are playoff-headed with less than 50 but with 44 and more wins. . . DENVER NUGGETS---A HOPED-FOR set of at least eight won of 11 games to be played by the now 36-46 Denver Nuggets since March 14 wasn’t to be, each against a team holding first or second place within a respective division, among them, the Miami Heat, the L.A. Clippers twice, the Washington Wizards, Oklahoma City Thunder, San Antonio x two, Houston Rockets x 2, the Golden State Warriors x 2. Winning the lion’s share of these games would have underscored the Nuggets as a better than marginal team, though in fourth position of the West’s Northwest. The Nuggets won five of the 11, last of these being a 116-112 loss to the Warriors on April 16, also last game of NBA-2013/14 for the Nuggets. Of the five wins, one was nearly a loss, the Nuggets 100-99 victory taken from the Warriors on April 10. The four other wins were by three or more points, best Nuggets victory spread a 110-100 win against the Clippers. Of the six losses, four ended in double-digit points behind the winning team, e.g., a Spurs 133-103 win and a Thunder 117-96 victory. Telling about the Nuggets during the 11 games versus the NBA’s highest ranking teams is from a look at points that the five games were won by atop points gained by the opposing teams, this alongside the total number of points that the six Nuggets games were lost by beneath points accrued by the opposing franchises. The total number of points won above those of the five opposing (losing) teams is quite low---27, while the number of points lost to opposing team ppg’s is 63, which is almost three points given away for each point earned by the Nuggets, indicating a defense that cannot secure a lead often enough and an offense that cannot put enough points on the board so as to offset defense weaknesses. Yet some consolation can be drawn from the Nuggets having scored more than 100 points per in seven of the 11 games vs. the NBA’s higher ranked teams, and certainly from Wednesday night’s battle vs. the Warriors, one of those defeats that carry triumphs within, e.g., Nuggets Randy Foye finishing with 32 points and 11 assists, Kenneth Faried with 15 points and 13 rebounds. The talent is there for Nuggets Coach Brian Shaw to reset a team that’s been weakened considerably by injuries to top players and that until this year made it to nine consecutive post-seasons and last year entered the post-season with 57 wins. . . // MLB---NO-one’s singing the blues yet over a string of losses, no-one’s decided that the poet who said April is the cruelest month knew exactly what he was talking about. In light of many expectations, the 2014 transitions from an off-season and from way too short Spring Training haven’t reflected severe downturns for the majority of MLB clubs. Of course, we know that the world hasn’t been changing too dramatically when the Houston Astros, the Chicago Cubs and the Miami Marlins secure bottom of league positions as April shows signs of sliding into a season a lot like the year before. Too, many starts have been justifying several predictions, for instance, the L.A. Dodgers and the S.F. Giants atop the National League West, the St. Louis Cardinals now among NL Central’s top two teams, and the Washington Nationals a number two team within the NL East. Within the American League West, and as predicted, the Oakland A’s and the Texas Rangers are the top two teams, and the Detroit Tigers are at second within the AL Central, while the N.Y. Yankees are leading the AL East. Differences from last year do exist, however, and surprisingly so, e.g., the Boston Red Sox are in last place of the AL East and within the bottom five of the 30 MLB teams, while the NL West’s Arizona Diamondbacks are also holding a last place position and are faring worse than the Astros and the Marlins. Well, for some, April may really be the cruelest of months. . . // FORMULA 1 (Column repeated from Tuesday, April 15)---OKAY, you saw the film RUSH last year, so you know that Formula 1 (F1) motor racing is a most popular sport, second to soccer as the world’s richest and most viewed from stands and in front of TV sets. If the film hooked you and you performed some research, you also know that F1 Grand Prix (GP) races have been happening around the world for several generations and that every other weekend March through mid-November, 11 teams send two F1 cars and two drivers each to compete in 19 events in 18 countries, starting with the Australian GP, ending with the Abu Dhabi GP, including a U.S. F1 event that will take place this year at Austin, Texas, November 2. Unique about these races is that none occur on strictly oval racetracks, such as that for the Indy 500 and Nascar events. Instead, the F1 GP events occur on tracks similar to the design of real roadways, they include uneven though linear stretches and also angular distances and exceptionally hard turns, dips, etc., with a single F1 GP race being anywhere from 50 to 60 laps amounting to between 250 and 320 miles in distance, the F1 cars averaging between 130 and 180 mph along the linear. Also, F1 is unlike other motor sports from its universality. Though each F1 team is privately owned, they come from a large assortment of countries, as examples, Team Ferrari (Italy), Red Bull (Austria), McLaren (the U.K.), Honda (Japan), Sauber, Renault (France), Team India, Team MaRussia, their drivers from numerous countries, as well, and not necessarily from the country that a team is from. But this year is different from all other F1 years because of required major changes to engines and energy efficiency, to aerodynamics and so car configuration, to cockpit and brake demands and re. new tire requirements, therefore a year different in that each team has had to enter F1-2014 with new or dramatically reconstructed F1 cars and with drivers new to the alterations. Calling the current F1 season an experiment in ground vehicle power resulting from innovative construction and the marriage of various materials is far from verbal fabrication, and the observed results could exist within the next generation of privately owned vehicles. Among the year’s F1 requirements are a switch from V-8 to V-6 engines packaged with formulated electrical systems so that F1-2014 cars can meet the hybrid challenge successfully. Too, there’s a new limit on amount of fuel that an F1 car can contain per race (35 percent less than in recent years), and a new regulation has called for means capable of capturing, holding and re-using energy that can escape mostly from brake applications (Whenever a foot goes from gas pedal to use of brakes, a certain amount of energy seeks the atmosphere and so has been wasted but today can be held and re-used), also there’s mandatory employment of tires that can meet nearly all weather and surface conditions. Too, from dropping the nose shape of the F1 car this year, and narrowing the position of the car’s front wings while requiring a smaller rear wing, and there being minimum allowed car weight to 691 kilograms from 642 kg’s, all will reduce downforce and increase torque, allowing for faster yet more controllable gear shifting for the deep turn and for moving into imagined lanes right or left at higher speeds. So far, three F1-2014 GP events have occurred, the Australia, Maylaysia and Bahrain GP’s. This weekend is the China F1 GP, to be followed in May by the Spain and Monaco F1 GP weekends. Ahead in the championship competition so far, that’s Team Mercedes (U.K.), the drivers Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton, both F1 veterans. END/ml.