“There are two primary choices in life; to accept conditions as they exist, or accept the responsibility for changing them.”
Ed Graney
Ed Graney is a sports columnist for the Las Vegas Review-Journal, covering a variety of topics and the Las Vegas sports scene.
egraney@reviewjournal.com … @edgraney on Twitter. 702-383-4618
Let’s get this part out of the way: It’s not the new league or the travel. It is definitely not the weather for a Triple-A baseball franchise that spent more than three decades in Syracuse, which exists under a perpetual shade of dark gray and where locals have been known to define summer as three months of bad sledding.
The best types of spring football practices are the boring ones. Five or so weeks of drills that create as much news as a crossing guard promotion. An uneventful time when roles are defined and schemes are advanced with experienced players. A tedious stretch in which no serious injuries are suffered in April that might impact what happens in September.
Ken Walker seems like a nice fellow. He speaks with one of those engaging Texas drawls that he says is handed down from his Mama, where syllables are either dropped or overstressed, the kind you never tire of hearing.
You won’t find Oscar De La Hoya listed near the top of any account chronicling the best boxers over the last century. He doesn’t belong close to the legends of Robinson and Ali and Armstrong and Louis.
It’s like they are protecting the fort while awaiting fresh troops. Like they are trying to survive until all able bodies have arrived. Like they can see what is possible when game preparation isn’t split between scouting an opponent and reintroducing themselves to each other.
The telephone rang in the sports information office at UNLV around 2 p.m. on Thursday. A local college baseball fan had a question:
John Stockton couldn’t stop smiling. C. Vivian Stringer’s voice cracked with emotion. David Robinson spoke with the excitement of a teenager presented his first car.
DETROIT — There was a lot of talk about preparation around here the last few days, about how Michigan State’s coaching staff gets its basketball team ready to play big games on quick turnarounds, about how the Spartans have enough video experts to open a film school, about numerous 20-minute sessions for players throughout the day and sometimes late into the night.
DETROIT — There are varying degrees of causes. Some inspire nations. Others motivate small groups. Some change lives. Others alter ideals. Some make you remember. Others help you forget.
DETROIT — It’s almost like the whole UFO phenomenon. There are those who deeply believe in their existence and those who mock such faith. There are those who always will remain skeptical and those who always will keep an open mind.
If he and his North Carolina basketball coaches and teammates can get past that small but often difficult part about perception, Ty Lawson should play craps here every available second until the Tar Heels are eliminated from the Final Four or crowned its champion.
A colleague was bragging the other day about her NCAA Tournament bracket. She was closing in on first place and purposefully inquired where my entry sat among more than 60, knowing full well it had exploded like a cargo ship in Halifax Harbour once Wake Forest decided that rolling over and beginning its offseason early was more enticing than winning a lousy game or two.
