I have to say, I like the idea of the Ring video doorbell. However, I think they might've been wise to put a little more effort/time/ money into writing this commercial. I feel pretty confident in the fact that one thing this lady definitely would not say to the creepy guy who wants to break into her house by pretending to give free tree-trimming estimates is "I'm bathing the children right now."
On another note, I'm not buying this coffee-drinking wanna-be mom's fake story for one second.
The 1985-86 Boston Celtics went 50-1 at home (40-1 in the regular season and 10-0 in the playoffs) on their way to an NBA title. It's the best home record in league history.
The 2015-16 San Antonio Spurs are currently 29-0 in their own building. They're 52-9 overall, an .852 winning percentage that puts them on pace to finish 70-12, which would be the second-best record of all time (behind the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls who played .878 ball and went 72-10).
Unfortunately for the Spurs, their near-record pace is 3.5 games behindthe insanely good Steph Curry and the 55-5 (.917) Golden State Warriors. Like San Antonio, Golden State is also undefeated at home this year (26-0). Not only is there a chance the Spurs will post a better record than all but one team in NBA history and still enter the playoffs as major underdogs in their own conference, there's also a possibility San Antonio may win every home game it plays all season and fail to take home the title.
The Spurs could make it all the way to Game 7 of the Western Conference Finals vs. the Warriors (and lose) without dropping a single home contest. Depending on how many road wins they get in the early rounds, that scenario might leave them anywhere between 48-0 and 52-0 in San Antonio.
Golden State can also break Boston's 50-1 mark, and has the potential to end up from 49-0 to 57-0 at home. The Celtics' record is in jeopardy either way, but the prospect of the Spurs having a perfect home season and not winning a championship is somewhat mind-boggling.
The expected No. 1 pick in the NBA draft, Ben Simmons, plays for an 18-12 LSU team that likely won't even be there. That's weird. The last time a top-overall selection missed the tournament was 18 years ago, when Michael Olowokandi was selected first by the Clippers out of Pacific University.
Buddy Hield has taken the nation by storm, but after lifting Oklahoma to No. 1 in the AP poll in January, his Sooners have fallen back to No. 6 in the rankings.
According to Mytopsportsbooks.com, Kansas and Michigan St. are the co-favorites to win it all at 6/1. For comparison, last year Kentucky was 6/5 to take home the title (although Duke, who was 9/1, ended up winning).
ESPN's Joe Lunardi currently projects Kansas, Villanova (20/1), North Carolina (25/1) and Virginia (30/1) as the four top seeds. A No. 1 seed with 30/1 odds? Wow. Lunardi also has Xavier (40/1) as a No. 2 seed. If you're somebody who likes to put down money on winners instead of entering a standard fill-out-a-bracket pool, this is shaping up like a great tourney to pick a few long shots.
2. This exhibition match in Brazil used rescued dogs from a shelter as ball boys:
I this this concept definitely has potential if you could train the dogs to do a better job than they did in the above video. Although you'd probably also have to genetically alter them in some way so they don't slobber all over the balls...
On the other hand, if you put Leap Day in the middle of summer, people would be pumped (I guess there may be somewhere else in the world where February is the middle of summer, but whatever, I doubt I have many readers there). July 32 might be a little too weird for us to handle, but how about a June 31 or a September 31?
I'm not saying Stephen Curry is the greatest basketball player of all time--he's going to have to keep doing what he's doing for many more years and win a few more championships in order to take that title away from Michael Jordan (although as I suggested back in December, I do think it's going to happen).
But I will say this: Steph Curry is better at basketball right now than any human has ever been before.
Here's why:
The following was true after the game before Curry's epic performance on Saturday night in Oklahoma City:
Steph Curry has 4 career games of 50+ Pts while making 10+ 3-pointers.
On top of tying the league record for three-pointers in a game and breaking his own record for total threes in a season (with 24 games to go, by the way--that's 29 percent of the season remaining) on the same day, Curry's 53-5 Warriors also clinched a postseason berth Saturday (February 27):
In all the Curry insanity, it appears to be lost that Warriors also clinched a playoff spot faster than any team ever ('86 Celtics, Feb 28).
This is the beginning of my case as to why Curry is better than anyone we've ever seen before. It's not as if he hit 12 open threes--by my count, eight of his 12 treys were shots most players shouldn't even be taking. Watch this one in particular, in which Curry was several feet behind the three-point line and tightly guarded by seven-footer Steven Adams:
And how about this:
What's crazy to me is not that he's made half his shots from 30+ feet (even though the league average is 7.9 percent) but rather the fact that he's taken 22 and connected on 11 of them. The three-point line is 23'9"--who shoots from outside of 30 feet?
In my day no one shot from 30 feet because what the hell that's totally insane.
And that gets to the crux of my argument, Curry's preposterous game-winner on Saturday. But before I delve into that, take a look at this legendary performance from Larry Bird in 1988 (jump to the 1:17 mark for Bird's Curry-like moment):
Bird's heroics are child's play compared to Curry's:
A few things are important when breaking this play down:
- When the Warriors got the ball with just under seven seconds left, they had a timeout, but didn't bother to use it.
- The game was tied so they didn't need a three-pointer, and Curry released the ball with nearly three full seconds remaining. He had plenty of time to get closer and take what most people would think is a much higher-percentage shot.
- Afterwards, Curry said he pulled up from where he did because he wanted to make sure to shoot before the defender picked him up--the distance he was from the hoop wasn't a factor.
Curry makes shots with ease that other players don't even of taking. For everyone else on the planet (and throughout history), that was a stupid shot to attempt in that situation. But for Steph Curry, it wasn't.
If you put Steph Curry on any NBA team, I think that team becomes the title favorite. He's transcending the game of basketball.
I have to say, I like the idea of the Ring video doorbell. However, I think they might've been wise to put a little more effort/time/ money into writing this commercial. I feel pretty confident in the fact that one thing this lady definitely would not say to the creepy guy who wants to break into her house by pretending to give free tree-trimming estimates is "I'm bathing the children right now."
