Monthly Archives: March 2023

LAWRENCE, Kan. (WIBW) – Kansas Jayhawks freshman guard Gradey Dick announced via Instagram and on ESPN’s television show NBA Today that he is declaring for the 2023 NBA Draft.

Dick first announced the news on Instagram, thanking the university and the fans.

If drafted, Dick would be the first KU freshman selected to the NBA Draft since Josh Jackson in 2017.

He was named to the All-Big 12 Second Team, All-Big 12 Newcomer Team and All-Big 12 Freshman Team. He finished his lone season at Kansas starting all 36 games, averaging 14.1 points/game and setting the KU freshman record for three-point field goals made (83).

The Wichita, Kan. native was a two-time Kansas Gatorade Player of the Year in high school, attending Wichita Collegiate and Sunrise Christian Academy.

Current NBA Draft projections list him as an early selection in the first round.

Kansas had two players drafted in the 2022 NBA Draft, with Ochai Agbaji picked 14th overall and Christian Braun selected 21st in the draft.

ALSO READ: KU forward Jalen Wilson named Wooden Award finalist

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Even Major League Baseball umpires are adjusting to the new rules.

On opening day Thursday, the umpires called a strike against the New York Mets’ Jeff McNeil because of a runner on first.

The umps initially ruled Pete Alonso did not get back to first base in time after a pitch. That put McNeil in an 0-2 hole despite only one pitch being thrown.

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Manager Buck Showalter of the New York Mets talks with home plate umpire Paul Emmel bout a call during the seventh inning against the Miami Marlins June 24, 2022, in Miami, Fla. (Eric Espada/Getty Images)

However, manager Buck Showalter said Friday the umps made a mistake, and a strike should not have been called.

Under the new rules, pitchers have 15 seconds to deliver a pitch, 20 with one or more runners on base. Batters have eight seconds to be “alert” in the batter’s box.

But the umps admitted to Showalter that a strike should not have been assessed to McNeil, who hit an RBI single anyway.

Pete Alonso of the New York Mets rounds the bases after hitting a home run against the Miami Marlins during the ninth inning at loanDepot park March 31, 2023, in Miami, Fla. (Megan Briggs/Getty Images)

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Showalter also said umps will start to issue warnings if baserunners are taking their sweet time.

“When I refereed basketball, it’s called preventive officiating, where you go, ‘Hey, get out of the lane,’ instead of blowing the whistle,” Showalter said Friday. “If they keep doing it, you pop them.” 

Manager Buck Showalter of the New York Mets argues a call with umpire Larry Vanover during a game against the Washington Nationals at Nationals Park Aug. 1, 2022, in Washington, D.C.   (Mitchell Layton/Getty Images)

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The Mets won the game, but fell 2-1 Friday to the Miami Marlins.

The Sacramento Kings are having their best season for a generation. Begrudging owners of what had been by far the longest current playoff-less streak in the NBA – out of the postseason since the 2005/06 season, a 17-year streak ten years longer than the Charlotte Hornets in second place, and only winning more than 33 games twice in that time – they have ended that streak in some style.

Already with 46 wins this season, the Kings find themselves in the provisional third seed in the Western Conference, and with a comfortable five game lead at the time of writing over the Phoenix Suns in fourth. They are a full seven and a half games up on the Minnesota Timberwolves in eighth, and their 46-30 pace after 76 games far outstrips the 27-49 pace they were playing at come the same point last season.

They are going back to the playoffs. It is now just a question of whether they are seeded second or third.

At the crux of this reinvention has been substantial offensive improvements. Last year’s Kings ranked a lowly 25th in the NBA in offensive rating, yet in 2022/23, they are ranked first. Behind that reformation has been some key additions in the forms of sweet-shooting rookie Keegan Murray and a career-best season from the still-only-25 Malik Monk, as well as of course the dominance on the interior of All-Star Lithuanian big man Domantas Sabonis. These additions in turn have rejuvenated the performances of incumbent veterans De’Aaron Fox and Harrison Barnes; with six players averaging in double figures on the season, including 25.6 points per game from Fox, it is an unrecognisable Sacramento Kings offensive unit from last season.

That said, the defence could certainly still use a boost.

For all the well-earned good vibes around the franchise right now, the defence still ranks a lowly 24th on the season, and since the start of February, it is even worse – 27th, or fourth-last. This is not usually something becoming of one of the best teams in the NBA, which, otherwise, the Kings have been.

With only six games left in the season, there is not a huge amount of time left to do much about that. The roster is essentially set, the rotation solidified, the playbook written. Warts and all, this is the defensive line-up that the Kings are going to battle with, and they will have to plain outscore their opponents come playoff time.

Perhaps, though, there is scope over these final few regular season games to give a meaningful run-out to one of their better defensive prospects.

Portuguese centre Neemias Queta is about to complete his second full season with the Kings, yet in nearly two full calendar years, he has still barely yet to feature. In bit-part minutes of 19 games, he has totalled only 144 NBA minutes, almost all of which came in garbage time, and of which only 24 came this season. Instead, he has been down in the G-League on a two-way contract. And in his two years down there, he has done about as much as can be done.

In 29 games with the Stockton Kings this season, Queta has averaged 16.8 points, 8.9 rebounds, 2.4 assists and 1.9 rebounds per game. He has shot 68.5% from the field and 80.3% from the line for a staggering .759% true shooting percentage, and although the allure of him potentially adding some floor-stretching ability (as alluded to in his summer league performances) has proven entirely premature, he has nevertheless been hugely effective in a more conventional centre role.

As a defender in the paint, Queta exhibits good reads and better timing. Standing 7’0 tall and weighing 245lbs, he has ideal size for the NBA centre spot, and while he does not step up to the perimeter all that well given that size, when he stays back, the lane is his. Queta is always a presence in there, standing tall and contesting anyone driving at him, making fewer mistakes than the foul rates imply. And although his offensive game is not quite as developed, his size, decent footwork, touch, efficient free throw shooting and modicum of vertical spacing make him a viable option to roll, catch, finish and tidy up.

Indeed, at this point, there seems little else that Queta can prove. At the G-League level, while the scoring profile is still somewhat limited and the foul rates somewhat high, these will not matter too much in an NBA reserve role. After all, they have not held back Walker Kessler.

Despite being a starter for the Kings for the last three years, Richaun Holmes was moved to a bench role this season, appearing in only 320 minutes all season. The Kings clearly decided he was not the defensive anchor at the centre spot that they needed. Similarly, Alex Len has barely got off the bench, playing a meagre 81 minutes all season and mostly just spending them fouling. Chimezie Metu plays, but is better offensively, and for all of Sabonis’s offensive majesty, him playing the centre spot is a large part of the reason for the leaky lane the Kings give up every night.

Trey Lyles certainly is not the defensive answer either. So at this point, for one week at least, why not set Queta free?

For three days, Kenny Brooks’ therapy involved his bed and his television remote control. Channel after channel. Every reality show. Even old episodes of “Little House on the Prairie.” Anything to get his mind off what had been taken away.

Nothing immediately worked.

There was no quick cure for the sudden-onset depression of having Virginia Tech’s chance at going to its first NCAA women’s basketball tournament in 14 years ripped from the clutches of Brooks’ players by the coronavirus outbreak.

“Heartbreak,” said Brooks, who just finished his fourth season as Tech’s coach. “I’m not going to lie. It was heartbreak for me.”

Given how much his team achieved this season, going 21-9 overall and 11-7 in the ACC (Tech’s most wins in the conference since joining in the 2004-2005 season), he knows he’s not the only one suffering.

“To have it just pulled out from underneath of you, it’s cause for a lot of sulking on our part, probably,” Brooks said. “Then, when you understand the realness of the situation, it kind of takes precedent over that.”

As brutal as the cancellation of the tournament was for Brooks, he realizes it was even harder for seniors Taja Cole, Lydia Rivers and Kendyl Brooks, his daughter.

Last May, Cole and Rivers transferred to Tech – Cole from Georgia and Rivers from Radford. Both were starters this past season.

Cole averaged 9.6 points, 5.4 rebounds and a team-high 6.5 assists per game on her way to earning ACC All-Defensive team honors. Rivers contributed 6.4 points and a team-best 8.1 rebounds per game.

“For me, I’ve done it,” said Kenny Brooks, who got to the tournament six times when he coached James Madison before arriving at Tech.

“I’ve been there. I’ve had my name called before. Obviously, I have years left and I’ll have opportunities for it to happen again, but to watch Taj Cole, Lydia Rivers and Kendyl not be able to achieve that anymore, it’s just heartbreak. I think the thing that really snaps you back to reality is the seriousness of the situation. We’ve never experienced anything like this before.”

Even before the tournament was canceled, Kendyl Brooks endured a tough senior season. She lost her final year on the court when she had to undergo hip surgery before the start of the season.

Her younger sister and teammate, Chloe Brooks, will have other chances to reach the tournament, having just finished her redshirt freshman season. Not only will Kendyl Brooks never get to experience the NCAA tournament as a player, she also learned last Thursday she won’t be able to participate in a graduation ceremony, since Tech canceled it because of the outbreak.

“Being my first child to graduate, that would’ve been an accomplishment for our family,” Kenny Brooks said. “To have that taken away, it’s almost like compounding the issue.”

Though he’d have rather spent the early part of last week scouting opponents for the NCAA tournament before traveling to a tournament site, Kenny Brooks knew he had to push forward. Finally climbing out of bed, he made his way back into the office.

Learning via text message from sophomore starting guard Dara Mabrey (11.9 ppg, third on the team in scoring) that she’s entering the NCAA’s transfer portal, Kenny Brooks started to take stock in what he has coming back next season, rolled up his sleeves and went about the business of recruiting.

Last Thursday, he was in the office from 9 a.m. until about midnight, at least partially because he had video conferences set up at various times with recruits. The video conferences took the place of face-to-face visits, which are temporarily suspended because of the outbreak.

He estimates over the course of three days last week he did about 10 video conferences – far more than he’d usually do if he could’ve actually visited with recruits.

“It’s making me a little bit exhausted,” Kenny Brooks said.

Despite his understanding that the show must go on, he’s been stunned by how many players have been willing to proceed with plans to test the transfer waters.

“The first thing that really blows me away, honestly, is the amount of kids putting their name in the portal,” Kenny Brooks said. “Sometimes, I’m like, ‘Hey, there’s a national state of emergency going on. There’s a pandemic that we’re in,’ and kids are putting their name in the portal like everything is fine.”

Looking back, he’ll always feel as if his team didn’t get the final exam grade it deserved for its season, which he refers to as perhaps the “most enjoyable … that I’ve ever had with a group of kids.”

“You aced the test,” Kenny Brooks said. “You knew you did a fantastic job, and the teacher probably graded it and then just never gave it back to you so that you have validation for it.”

Norm Wood, 757-247-4642, nwood@dailypress.com

The Indiana University men’s basketball program has had three scholarship players enter the transfer portal within the last week, but the one roster change that was anticipated all along finally became official Friday.

Indiana freshman guard Jalen Hood-Schifino announced on his Instagram account he is declaring himself available for the NBA Draft.

“Ever since I was a little boy, it has been my dream to play in the NBA. With that being said, I’m ready to take this next step in my basketball career and declare for the 2023 NBA Draft. The time is NOW,” Hood-Schifino wrote in his Instagram post.

Hood-Schifino did not indicate in his post whether he left open the possibility to return to IU, but ESPN NBA reporter Adrian Wojnarowski reported Hood-Schifino will forego his remaining college eligibility.

Hood-Schifino averaged 13.5 points, 4.1 rebounds and 3.7 assists per game for the 23-12 Hoosiers. Hood-Schifino converted 41.7% of his shots, including 33.3% from 3-point range.

“From start to finish, my freshman season has been nothing short of amazing,” Hood-Schifino wrote. “To the fans and people in Bloomington, you welcomed me with open arms. I can’t thank you enough.”

Hood-Schifino started all 32 games he played this season but took on a much-larger role after Xavier Johnson broke his foot in a Dec. 17 game at Kansas.

Until then, Hood-Schifino was an off-guard who demonstrated a capacity for distribution. He averaged more assists with Johnson than without him, but he didn’t have the ball in his hands as often as Johnson did to facilitate the offense.

After Dec. 17, Hood-Schifino was Indiana’s primary ball-handler. Though he provided regular service to Trayce Jackson-Davis in the post, Hood-Schifino very often called his own number.

Hood-Schifino attempted 13.7 shots per game after Johnson was injured. Hood-Schifino was streaky. He was dazzling in a 35-point effort at Purdue on Feb. 25. He hit five or more 3-pointers in a game three times, all in January against Iowa, Northwestern and Ohio State.

Like most shooters, Hood-Schifino could also slump. He had eight games against Power Six teams where he shot worse than 30% from the field. In the NCAA tournament, Hood-Schifino converted 36.4% against Kent State and Miami.

Hood-Schifino’s lack of fear when it came to shooting was equally an asset and occasionally problematic. He had 12 of 17 (Northwestern), 8 of 12 (Ohio State) and 14 of 24 (Purdue) performances as well as 2 of 11 (Minnesota and Kansas), 1 of 9 (Xavier) and 1 of 14 (Maryland) during the season.

Most NBA mock drafts have Hood-Schifino in the lower half of the first round, though most also acknowledge his upside of being a lottery pick-level talent given he’s just a year removed from high school.

It is not out of the realm of possibility both Hood-Schifino and Jackson-Davis could be chosen in the first round. If that happened, it would be the first time since 2013 when Cody Zeller and Victor Oladipo both went in the first round.

The NBA Draft will take place June 22.

I’ve been hard on the Commish. I have. There have been a lot of things that Rob Manfred has done in the eight years since he assumed stewardship of Major League Baseball from Bud Selig that I’ve taken issue with, found fault with. Those things are all a part of his permanent record. 

But so is this: 

The game is better this year than it was last year. 

OK: This is a ridiculously small sample size upon which to pass judgment, I get that. But it is hard to shake the notion that the 2023 season, even in the wee small hours of early morning, looks different — better — than the one we last saw as midnight struck on the 2022 season. 

And let us count the ways: 

1. Time of game 

I get it: No demographic has both waxed poetic through the years about baseball’s timeless (and clock-less) nature and complained about the fact the games take forever than the men and women who write about baseball. I shall plead nolo contendere on behalf of myself and every one of my colleagues. 

That said: this was not a just a complaint of ink-stained wretches. At least once — usually multiple times — as recent nine-inning baseball games have dragged on past 3 ½ and four hours there will be some voice screeching from the upper deck who has grown weary from inactivity: “JUST THROW THE DAMNED BALL!” is the cleanest version of this complaint. 

They throw the damn ball now. The Yankees-Giants game on Opening Day wrapped in a tidy 2:33, and Mets-Marlins clocked in at 2:42. The average game went 2:45, 18 minutes shorter than last year’s average of 3:03. And the seven games played on Opening Day last year stretched to an average of 3:11. Apologies to Max Scherzer, shorter games are better games for everybody, and the pitch clock is the engine for that. And the quirks — like whatever it was that cost Jeff McNeil a strike in Miami — will work themselves out. 

Full disclosure: My argument against pitch clocks was always this: I remember as a kid, when I’d get to go to one or two games a year, I’d root for extra innings because I wanted to stay at the ballpark forever. Three things: a) I was a super-nerdy kid; b) it was 1976 and our entertainment options were limited; c) baseball remains the grandest of all games when baseball is actually being played — inactivity appeals to nobody. 

2. Limiting pick-off plays/oversized bags 

Teams will figure out the first part. And the second … well, to the naked eye the bases look the same, but the new 18-inch bags mean the bases are 4 ½ inches closer to each other than they used to be. And so it was unsurprising that there were 21 steals among the 15 games (in 23 tries). That’s the most for an Opening Day since … 1907! 

Full disclosure: The worst casualty of the launch-angle era was that not just the stolen base, but smart aggressive baserunning in general became marginalized. I will admit: I prefer triples to home runs, and I prefer seeing a guy go first-to-third (even Daniel Vogelbach did that Thursday!) to upper-tank home runs. I’m still pretty nerdy. 

3. No more shifts 

Yep, for years I was among the brigade who screamed: big-league hitters should figure out how to beat the shift. I was flipped by two realities: a) the original shift was created for Ted Williams, and Teddy Ballgame figured out how to hit .344 in his career hitting through, over and under the shift; it’s not just modern players who are stubborn; b) the only people who like the idea of a short right fielder scooping up ball after ball that was a base hit for 125 years were pitchers. And nobody ever cares what pitchers feel when it affects offense. 

There were more hits-per-hour-of-baseball on Opening Day (just over 6) than on any in 20 years; in 2022 HPHOB was just over 5. That makes a huge difference. 

Full disclosure: Though I did love a) that the Royals loopholed the rule by moving right fielder MJ Melendez to short right against old friend Joey Gallo, shifting the other outfielders way toward right to cover for him; b) that Gallo hit a textbook double-play ground ball right at Melendez; c) that Melendez then bobbled the ball and booted the play. The game is still played by human beings, after all. 

4. Extra-inning games 

There were none on Opening Day, so we were ghosted by the ghost runner, and this isn’t a new rule so much as a newish one that still draws debate. So I will go straight to … 

Full disclosure: Here’s another rule I was dead-set against when it was invented in COVID Summer, and it is good that it disappears in October. But much as the appeal of a five-hour Yankees-Red Sox game has all but evaporated, so, too, has the appetite for 17-inning games in May and August. Here’s what I would do: play the 10th inning straight. Play the 11th with the ghost man on first. And from there on out, play with the man on second. 

For what it’s worth: new NCAA President Charlie Baker is 6-foot-6. He’s tall, which is fitting, because the task ahead of him is tall, as well.

In his first month on the job, Baker has acknowledged as much. The former two-term Massachusetts governor has pointed to a college sports world in the midst of change, including perhaps the tallest of tasks: how to handle the Name, Image and Likeness era.

“I think one of the things we have going for us now is we know what it looks like without any rules,” Baker said of NIL. “No one knew when this all started. People said we need rules, and everybody is like, ‘Why don’t we see what happens?’ Well now we know what happens: Everybody lies.”

Baker was in Dallas on Friday for the women’s Final Four semifinals, but first he took a visit to the Nash-Davis Recreation Center to take a tour and visit the “Final Four dream court” that was gifted by the NCAA to the west Dallas community. He took some time to talk to The Dallas Morning News about that, as well as NIL, which is back at the forefront after this week’s congressional hearing on it.

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It seems like women’s college basketball has had a rise in popularity, especially in terms of ticket prices at this weekend’s Final Four. How much is this year’s Final Four in Dallas a showcase for the rise of women’s popularity?

Baker: “I think being in a place like Dallas, where the NCAA has been before for a lot of events, is a great place to showcase because Dallas has experience with these kind of events. You have the resources, you have the facilities, you have the hotel infrastructure, and you have a lot of people who really like sports, and that makes a big difference. I also think you have four very strong teams in the women’s Final Four, and they’re different, and they bring different styles to this that obviously bring different type of personnel. But these are four really fun teams to watch, and I think these are going to be great games.”

How was the tour [of the Nash-Davis center and the new dream court]?

Baker: “It was great. Having been in the public sector at the state level, and having worked with a lot of colleagues in local government, I’ve been to a lot of these kinds of places and circumstances where there’s been public money invested and foundational money and all kinds of things, and I’m a big believer that these kinds of parks, these kinds of facilities, they make neighborhoods and they make families and their communities. And I’m thrilled we have a chance to participate. And I’ll tell you something: I’ve never seen a court with that material before, and I’m going to walk away from this place wanting to learn more about that and how we might think about incorporating that technology into a lot of stuff we’re doing.”

Switching gears: The first NIL bills started to be introduced in 2019-2020 and everyone was pretty unanimous that we want to get this done and we want uniformity. And yet, here we are in 2023 still talking about it. How hard is it to actually get everyone at the congressional and Senate level to agree on what NIL should look like?

Baker: “I think one of the things we have going for us now is we know what it looks like without any rules. No one knew when this all started. People said we need rules, and everybody is like, ‘Why don’t we see what happens?’ Well now we know what happens: Everybody lies. That’s the big line coming from a number of athletic directors, and they’re right … and that puts families in a terrible spot. It puts student-athletes in a bad spot. It puts schools and everybody else in a bad spot. And it creates opportunities for people to game families and game student athletes. I think there’s almost universal agreement that there ought to be a registry of contacts and there ought to be some type of financial literacy program made available for families. There should be a registration process for agents like there is other agents, and there should be a uniform standard contract. Some of the stories I hear about kids who signed things that were told something and X turned out to be Y. And some of the misrepresentation that goes on with student athletes…

“I happen to think if you create a transparent registry around that stuff people can actually being to see what the ‘market’ really looks like. I think it would be a huge improvement for everyone.

So while you wait for the government to figure that out.

Baker: “We’re still going to work on it.”

How do you manage guys manage for when it’s time to say, “You know what, we’re not going to wait and we’re going to do it ourselves?”

Baker: “I’ve told people we need to work on coming up with what we can do on those issues, which everybody seems to agree on. The problem we ultimately have is there have been a lot of state laws passed that basically said schools in their state don’t comply with laws that were passed by the NCAA and conferences, and that’s a huge problem. And I would argue for conferences that they want everybody playing the same.”

So it’s safe to say there is serious motivation to get this done, regardless of the federal government?

Baker: “Yes. We need to do something here. And if the Feds do it, I think it would be better because of the pre-emption issues in the national standard, but we’re going to need to make something happen here.”

On Twitter: @JoeJHoyt

Find more college sports coverage from The Dallas Morning News here.

BLOOMINGTON — The Indiana men’s basketball program has had three scholarship players enter the transfer portal within the last week, but the one roster change that was anticipated all along finally became official Friday.

Indiana freshman guard Jalen Hood-Schifino announced on his Instagram account he is declaring himself available for the NBA Draft.

“Ever since I was a little boy, it has been my dream to play in the NBA. With that being said, I’m ready to take this next step in my basketball career and declare for the 2023 NBA Draft. The time is NOW,” Hood-Schifino wrote in his Instagram post.

Hood-Schifino did not indicate in his post whether he left open the possibility to return to Indiana, but ESPN NBA reporter Adrian Wojnarowski reported Hood-Schifino will forego his remaining college eligibility.

Hood-Schifino averaged 13.5 points, 4.1 rebounds and 3.7 assists for the 23-12 Hoosiers. Hood-Schifino converted 41.7% of his shots, including 33.3% from 3-point range.

“From start to finish, my freshman season has been nothing short of amazing,” Hood-Schifino wrote. “To the fans and people in Bloomington, you welcomed me with open arms. I can’t thank you enough.”

Hood-Schifino started all 32 games he played this season but took on a much-larger role after Xavier Johnson broke his foot in a Dec. 17 game at Kansas.

Until then, Hood-Schifino was an off guard who demonstrated a capacity for distribution. He averaged more assists with Johnson than without him, but he didn’t have the ball in his hands as often as Johnson did to facilitate the offense.

After Dec. 17, Hood-Schifino was Indiana’s primary ball-handler. Though he provided regular service to Trayce Jackson-Davis in the post, Hood-Schifino very often called his own number.

Hood-Schifino attempted 13.7 shots per game after Johnson was injured. Hood-Schifino was streaky. He was dazzling in a 35-point effort at Purdue on Feb. 25. He hit five or more 3-pointers in a game three times, all in January against Iowa, Northwestern and Ohio State.

Like most shooters, Hood-Schifino could also slump. He had eight games against Power Six teams where he shot worse than 30% from the field. In the NCAA Tournament, Hood-Schifino converted 36.4% against Kent State and Miami.

Hood-Schifino’s lack of fear when it came to shooting was equally an asset and occasionally problematic. He had 12-of-17 (Northwestern), 8-of-12 (Ohio State) and 14-of-24 (Purdue) performances as well as 2-of-11 (Minnesota and Kansas), 1-of-9 (Xavier) and 1-of-14 (Maryland) during the season.

Most NBA mock drafts have Hood-Schifino in the lower half of the first round, though most also acknowledge his upside of being a lottery pick-level talent given he’s just a year removed from high school.

It is not out of the realm of possibility both Hood-Schifino and Jackson-Davis could be chosen in the first round. If that happened, it would be the first time since 2013 when Cody Zeller and Victor Oladipo both went in the first round.

The NBA Draft takes place June 22.