Of draft picks and legacies and, yes, Liz's big weekend

Think I mentioned that a few of the Henchmen are out in Minnesota this weekend for one of those gang workouts for draft eligible kids that’s basically for second-rounders.

Well, it’ll be interesting to see what they think when they get back.

As you know, second-round draft picks haven’t been the most glorious part of the past for the HOTH, unless you’re thinking Remon Van de Hare, Giorgos Printezis, Solo!!!!, DeeAndre Hulett or Tyson Wheeler are just gems being polished.

And this year, it could be double the fun, given that the Raptors now have two picks in the second round.

Or it couldn’t, according to Bryan.

“It may even be unlikely that we utilize both picks, one being a little bit later. Maybe you take a player based on future, if there is someone on the board who piques our interest but would be better served playing a season or two in Europe whether or not that player was an international player.

“A lot of times a second round pick finds himself in a situation where the contract offer is just not there and they are better suited going to Europe and making a little bit of money and developing their game.”

I know one of the fun things to do is rag on these guys for not making the most of the second round picks they’ve had and, sure, Van de Hare, Wheeler, Hulett and Printezis are pretty good examples but, frankly, it’s so much more an inexact science when you’re picking 35-60 that teams probably deserve a bit of a break from constant criticism.

We know the draft is a crapshoot in the top 10 or 14 (see Oden vs. Durant, everyone vs. the Lakers wanting Kobe, etc, etc, etc), think how much basic luck you need to have a second-rounder pan out.

Lots. And lots.

I don’t know if these guys, or any team, can find a gem that far down the list, for every Manu Ginobili (who was years away from being a player when he was chosen, huge credit to the Spurs staff for that one) there are dozens of gambles that simply don’t pan out across the league.

It’s why I tend to zone out when the second round starts, it’s barely worth paying attention to.

More Bryan on it:

“Second round picks have been places where teams have hit the occasional triple, maybe even home run. You could call a Manu Ginobili in the second round parked in Europe, that’s a home run, maybe a grand slam. You look at the Paul Milsap pick, that’s a triple and yes, we acknowledge he was on the board when we picked that year. But that’s where you have to do a lot of homework, but again get a little bit lucky as well.”

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So Liz gets to the big 6-0 in charge this weekend or something, right?

Funnily enough, it’s not all over the news down here in OKC but I did hear about it from back home.

Good for her; couple more decades or so and she can reach the level of Hazel.

Of all the jobs in the world, wouldn’t being Queen, or even a basic run-of-the-mill lowly Royal, be one of the all-time greats?

You don’t do an awful lot, people bow and curtsy towards you all the time and you can travel wherever you want on someone else’s dime and see the world.

People fawn over you, the hours are what you make them and no one’s really ever been fired from the gig. It’s a job for life and it looks really, really easy.

Outside of Canadian Senator or Governor-General or something like that, it seems like one of the great jobs in the world.

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Love the way the league rigged that game last night so the Spurs-Thunder series got much better.

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Looks like rain might be coming here, maybe some stool time later this afternoon and what better way to kill some time than doing mail, right?

Let me hear from you so I can get it done and maybe sleep in tomorrow morning. That’d be nice, wouldn’t it?

Click. Write. Send.

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How the heck did it get to be June already?

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So what do we think might happen up in Boston tonight when Game 3 unfolds?

The one thing about this group of Celtics that’s been impressive the past few years has been their mental resolve but coming back after that gut-wrenching Game 2 loss is probably going to be too much for them to handle.

They didn’t get a lot of calls while LeBron and Wade kind of ran amok, they did all they could to keep the game close and still couldn’t close the deal in the final few minutes and you wonder when the mental grind is going to get to them.

Tonight?

I wonder.

The one guy I want to watch closely will be Rondo, who was so utterly excellent in Game 2 with nothing to show with it. We know he can be brilliant, we also know he can be mercurial and go for stretches where he has little impact on the game.

I do know that given the circumstances – the iffy bench, the health of Ray Allen, the stakes of being down 2-0 to a team that has better talent – this has to be one of those nights where he follows up his Game 2 effort with something close it in Game 3.

Can he?

Not sure.

But if he can’t, the Celtics can’t win and I can’t see that series even getting to five games.

Not much pressure on the kid, is there?

All that’s on the line is this series and, in some ways, the legacy of the Big Three. This is unquestionably their last kick at the can, it’s strange to think that the “other” guy is going to be so responsible for how they’re remembered.

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Comments

[Dan]

I totally disagree on the Celtics. We're not going to look back on this era and think of this past season when they've been fairly irrelevant. I think people will think back on the 2008 and 2010 teams that went to the finals, they'll think of the defensive brilliance over the years, they'll think of the Big Three restoring glory to the franchise. I can't see how losing to Miami in 4 games rather than 5 or 6 this year will have any significant bearing on how this era is viewed a few years down the line. But it is startling to see how Rondo has bypassed the other in ability over the years.

[Aural Fine print]

True, member of Royal family would be a good gig, but when "fired" the results are a bit more dire.

Ask Mary Queen of Scotts, Charles 1 of England or

1.1589 Henry III of France by Jacques Clément
2.1610 Henry IV of France by François Ravaillac
3.1622 Osman II of the Ottoman Empire by the Grand Vizier Davud Pasha
4.1792 Gustav III of Sweden by Jacob Johan Anckarström
5.1801 Emperor Paul of Russia by Count Pahlen and his accomplices
6.1828 Shaka King of the Zulus by his half-brother and successor Dingane and accomplices
7.1881 Alexander II of Russia by Ignacy Hryniewiecki, a member of Narodnaya Volya (People's Will)
8.1895 Min of Joseon by three mercenary killers allegedly hired by Japanese minister to Korea Miura Goro
9.1896 Nasser al-Din Shah, Qajar king of Persia (Iran), by Mirza Reza Kermani.
10.1898 Empress Elisabeth of Austria by Luigi Lucheni an insane anarchist in Geneva.
11.1900 Umberto I of Italy by anarchist Gaetano Bresci.
12.1903 Alexander I of Serbia and his wife Queen Draga by a group of army officers.
13.1908 Carlos I of Portugal by Alfredo Costa and Manuel Buiça, both connected to the Carbonária (the Portuguese section of the Carbonari)
14.1913 George I of Greece by Alexandros Schinas
15.1918 Nicholas II of Russia and the Imperial Family executed by a Bolshevik firing squad under the command of Yakov Yurovsky.
16.1934 Alexander I of Yugoslavia by Vlado Chernozemski, a member of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization
17.1946 Ananda Mahidol of Thailand. The King's death is still a mystery and may have been either regicide or suicide. The subject is never openly discussed in Thailand.
18.1958 Faisal II of Iraq executed by firing squad under the command of Captain Abdus Sattar As Sab, a member of the coup d'état led by Colonel Abdul Karim Qassim.
19.1975 Faisal of Saudi Arabia by his nephew Faisal bin Musa'id (Assassin publicly beheaded)
20.2001 Birendra of Nepal by his son Crown Prince Dipendra in the massacre of the Nepalese royal family; Dipendra proceeded to commit suicide without having been crowned king.

[Stavros]

Doug, You forgot to count sports reporter among the all time great jobs. Sure you have travel issues, deadlines and have to deal with egomaniacs on regular basis, some of them even athletes, but overall it seems like a pretty sweet gig.

[Wilber]

While we're taking 2nd rounders, refresh my memory on Matt Bonner. He was a 2nd round pick, didn't Chicago pick him for us, then we asked him to go to Italy for a year. Does he count as 2nd round value?

Blogger's note: Sure it can count for that. Not sure they "asked" as much as he wasn't nearly ready and knew it

[Mike D.]

Being queen could well be a good gig, but I think you'd need the world's best poker face....burst out laughing if someone makes a mistake in a speech or something, and it's all over the papers. Similarly, shrieking "Off with his head!", just for the fun of it, after someone committed a trivial infraction of protocol might give the Beefeaters a chuckle but could cause a major international incident.

Self-control not being my forte, I think I'd end up as an addition to @Aural Fine print's list pretty quickly.

[SheikYurbouti]

I know this is a day late, but here's my response to GM and others than pose the possible conspiracy theory. For a lottery winner to be determined, 4 ping pong balls need to be selected, the combination of which determines the winner. The witnesses see this happen, then witness the same balls go back into the machine. If the balls are rigged, the same balls will keep coming up when they try do conduct the 2nd and 3rd draw. Since this doesn't happen, how could the balls possibly be rigged for the first draw?
With the method being used, and the witnesses present, I see it as impossible to fix, but perhaps I need an education of how it can be done.

[larry lukeeborg]

Aural Fine print sorta beat me to it, though I was just going to say that being a king or queen would be a great gig provided you keep your head.

[john]

While I would be astonished if the results of the lottery are rigged, rigging the lottery, or at least giving certain combinations a bit of a better chance cannot be considered inconceivable. Even rigged dice don’t always come up the same number every time.
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I have wondered for a long time why the NBA doesn’t do it out in the open though, kinda like they used to do the lottery draws on TV. You can say it only takes 90 seconds, but that’s still longer than it takes to open 12 envelopes. The 30 minute show is already 29 minutes of filler. Imagine the drama it would create when the final number coming out could mean completing a combination for a number teams and the high fiving it would create! Most importantly it would take the horrible and unnecessary optics out of their secretive draw.

[Rob.V]

You know, I used to think this was the end of the Celtics as we know them however myabe not so.
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How much different does this series look with Jeff Green and Avery Bradley on the wing against LBJ and Wade. Okay, they are certainly not the same calibre of players however the C 's will have money to spend this summer so it's not inconceivable that they re-sign KG for $10 million and still have money to go out and add more depth to their bench.
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Ray Allen hasn't given them much (due to injury) so if you add a couple of pieces to Pierce, KG, and Rondo along with the return of Bradley they are still in the mix for the conference next season.
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Experience wins. This is the approach the Raptors should look to as well. If they can add 2 All Star (like) players to the squad next season they are right there as well. Yes, easier said than done however I wouldn't rule out Pau Gasol for the Raptors.
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He's still one of the top big men in the game (L.A mismanged him this season) and would be a huge expiring deal the following season which is an asset as well .

[Peter]

Jose. Not a second round pick... not even a pick. He's now our highest paid Raptor. Just goes to show you that the second round isn't the only option to get a half decent player who isn't in the draft.

[Lorie]

Hi Doug!
OK. The royalty gig is usually pretty sweet; although thanks to @Aural Fine print a reminder for us all that there's no perfect job. Although...this morning I read about a fellow who writes travel articles for various journals with an emphasis on exotic food found in different parts of Italy. All while conducting research for his very successful historical novels which prominently feature - you guessed it - food. Sigh. Oh, well. As Steven Tyler says:
http://youtu.be/k6Qd9VR1gD8
So, any chance you'll be able to find a British-style pub to celebrate The Jubilee down there in Oklahoma City?
Cheers! And Rule Brittania!

[Tim H.]

@Lorie: It's not bad enough that I have to jump through hoops to see the YouTube videos at work, now I get a tantalizing hint at what should to be very good reads, but you don't reveal the author's name? How cruel! ;>)

[Lorie]

@Tim H. Ha! Well, the weather does seems to be dictating time spent indoors, so if you want to sample the wares of a new author his name is Anthony Capella. And I found two of his books today that are about to be devoured: "The Various Flavours of Coffee" and "The Empress of Ice Cream" (The latter book's set in the court of Louis XIV where - according to the plot synopsis - "ice cream is first and foremost a political weapon". Oh, yummy! Our favourite frozen treat - delicious dangerous and deadly in whole new ways!). So here's to rainy days, and eating while reading. ;)