I'm over the whole Lebron thing...Ok, No I'm not!

With the NBA finals starting tomorrow night and all the talk about "will this be the year for Lebron James to FINALLY get a ring on South Beach?", I have to take the time to address this topic. As much as I want to say that I am over the whole Lebron thing, I can not sit here with a clear conscience and say that's the truth, because it's not at all! 


I just want to say not one time did I root for the team that played the Heat in this playoff run. I did however root for Lebron to choke and miss the same shots wearing that Miami jersey that we remember him missing so very well here in Cleveland with the game on the line. A few of those games, he did just that. Dumping the ball off in the final seconds and not allowing himself to shoot the shot that matters the most. The last two games with Boston, he was on fire. I mean 45 points in game 6...CRAZY!  The man can play ball, there is NO DOUBT about that but...he did the city of Cleveland dirty! 

I remember this night very well...Sitting in my Parents house with Josh on July 8, 2010. Having had discussions prior to the special with them on how there is no way Lebron could have an hour  special on ESPN and not come back to Cleveland. He could not do that to fans who help build his empire, who supported him and made his name a brand! He could not do that to his home city, there is no way! 

Call it denial...I dont know...I mean we all seen him the the EC playoffs with Boston, his elbow, the loss of focus, him walking off the court after the loss with no handshakes or a presser after. He QUIT, he looked for any and every excuse he could find, why? Because he knew all along he wouldn't be back. I remember seeing this guy who carried a whole team on his back at times, look flat, unenthusiastic, tired, completely out of it, lacking heart and the will to win in that last Boston series. 

Then he sits down and talks about Miami like its the Promised Land...Like he cant wait to roll in to Canaan with his homies! 

Yes. It may be easy to win 8 championships with 3 all stars. Fine. BUT it hasnt happened yet! Last year the Mavs showed us that it takes a team of 5 guys to pull together enough to win a championship. Nothing is handed to us in life, the easy road isnt always the one that will get you to where you want to go. I hope that Lebron, D*Wade, and Bosh, finds that to be true in this 7 game series starting tomorrow night! That the "BIG 3" isnt anything with out the other guys on their bench...which they really dont have either! =)

Every Little Girls Dream

This year marks the 40th anniversary of the passing of Title IX, a law passed in 1972 that created equal rights for females in athletics.

They are 37 of the most influential words in female athletics....

 "No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any educational program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance."

Some of my favorite memories I have as a small girl are surrounded by sports! The earliest being my Dad throwing a Nerf football to me as I was running pass patterns across the living room or sitting and watching the Reds win the 1990 World Series with him at only 4 years old. Since a little girl I have been in love with the competition and  fascinated by everything sports related! 

I was never the girl who played with dolls or wanted to be a princess with the sparkly dress and play make up. For my birthday I wanted a basketball hoop and played football in the side yard until time for dinner and then went back outside until dark. I loved to get dirty and play with the boys! With all of that I learned from an early age the boys didnt always want me to play with them. While the girls on recess talked about what barbie they wanted or what boy the liked, I was begging the boys to let me play football. I remember running out everyday at lunch and lining up only to be the last one picked and never got to be the QB and the only time I got the ball thrown to me is when I was WIDE open and there absolutely no one with in 10 yards of me. LOL  That was the reason I ran out there everyday, to have that moment. That moment to show them that I could play, that I  could catch and I was able to make the move to make the others miss and score! I did that probably everyday from Kindergarten to 5th grade. 

One of my favorite childhood memories is a pick up game of football my cousin and I played in a neighbors yard against boys that was 3 to 5 years older than us and we killed them. Everyday we would go out and play, I was always the QB and he the receiver. I felt bad bc he would always get crap for bringing a girl to play. What they didnt know was this girl could throw a spiral 30 yards at 10 years old! haha 

Playing with the boys wasnt always fun, I got roughed up...A LOT! LOL There were cheap shots, elbows and hard hits almost every game I would play in. Even my cousins would lay me out when we played, I learned early on that I had to suck it up and keep playing! I was taught to get up, dust myself off, walk it off and keep playing. No tears! (Thanks Dad)

Eventually I got into playing organized sports, after a year of flag football in second grade (I was the only girl on the team) I decided I probably should stick with softball and basketball with the other girls and played into High School. 

I was watching the WNBA draft today with Josh and as they were talking about Title IX and how it paved the way for the ladies sitting there. I took a moment to think about what great athletes and coaches we would have missed if this not occurred. I mean can you really see Sammy Prahalis doing anything other than running fast breaks and executing perfect behind the back passes. Pat Summitt started playing Basketball at the University of Tennessee at Martin in 1970, 2 years before Title IX was passed. Summitt's parents paid for their daughters college because no scholarships were awarded to female athletes. What if it never had passed, would Pat Summitt become the Pat Summitt we all know today? Would she still have been the most winningest  coach in ALL of NCAA basketball history?  

You may not be a fan of Women's sports, you may not think its exciting. We may not hit as hard, or dunk on fast breaks, But we are athletes too. We know the game just as well as the boys and play OUR style, we play OUR game! We may still not get the multi-million dollar deals but we have come soooo far because of Title IX and if it not passed, we would still be playing. Not because of the money but because just like the boys...It's apart of us, it's who we are, WE ARE IN LOVE WITH THE GAME!

This Quote from  Pat Summitt sums it up...

"I had to drive the van when I first started coaching," Summitt said. "One time, for a road game, we actually slept in the other team's gym the night before. We had mats, we had our little sleeping bags. When I was a player at the University of Tennessee-Martin, we played at Tennessee Tech for three straight games, and we didn't wash our uniforms. We only had one set. We played because we loved the game. We didn't think anything about it."

No Blood, No Foul?

Growing up playing pick up game after pick up game with my uncles, cousins, and their older friends, I learned very quickly that the games were not stopping for touch fouls. If I was going to the basket, I was getting laid out and I better try my best to finish b/c nothing was getting called on my behalf. Most of the time it was a No Blood, No Foul type of game and sometimes, especially the boys, came at me harder b/c I was a girl. 

The years that I played in school and rec leagues, I learned real quick that there is a difference between hard fouls and just completely dirty play!  The hard fouls got me the nick name Truck...what can I say I was physical in the paint! haha

I was not feeling well tonight and looking at Yahoo Sports, I came across this video. It is of a High School basketball game in Washington where the cameraman taping the game to show just how bad the Refs in the area are. With that, he caught five borderline extremely hard  / flagrant fouls.  Four of them and probably the hardest came from number 34, Cole Vanderbilt. While a few of these fouls could be called just playing the game hard, the fifth one committed by Cole is definitely one I would call a flagrant. As you watch these clips you can see what happens when the refs do not take control of the game and allow things to escalate! 

CHECK OUT THE VIDEO!!!!! 

Now with watching the video, I have to raise the question. Was this on the Coach or the kid playing hard and being allowed to keep going until he laid that player out at the end, because the refs didn't call the game properly? 


Playing and attending all kinds of HS games with my husband, I have seen games get out of control and seen top players being singled out and rocked under the basket. You can tell the teams that maybe have been instructed by the coach to go after the best player and the kids that play hard and are a little hot headed. As a player I fed off of that, as a spectator it makes me a nervous wreck! The last thing anyone wants to see is a kid get severely injured do to a douche bag coach or a kid that thinks he/she is a thug on the court. 


I believe we can all agree that this game was poorly called and the referees did not do their job and allowed the game to get out of hand.