What is happening to the Tigers?

 (Sorry for the late posting, wedding preparation comes before the blog)

Back in the 1990s when basketball was at its highest there was a heated battle by three NBL teams for Melbourne’s heart – my North Melbourne Giants, the cool South East Melbourne Magic and the stalwart Melbourne Tigers.  These teams went head to head many times and the fans loved it.  The rivalry was almost as intense as AFL supporters and if you supported one team the others were less than scum.  Unfortunately as the interest in basketball waned in Australia the Magic and the Giants merged to form the Victoria Titans and then Titans that rivalry just wasn’t there.  It was the Tigers as THE Melbourne team with the Titans/Giants being on the backburner a little.  As we all know the Giants folded as well, leaving the Tigers as the sole owner of Melbourne.  This was a decent position for the fans to have as many Giants/Magic fans moved to the Tigers and were happy.  Regrettably this monopoly bred apathy from the club towards its fans and that all came to a head in the previous season.

Daryl Corletto

A lot has been said about the former owner Seamus McPeake and his antics but the two main incidents from the previous year were the Corletto and Ubaka scandals.  Daryl Corletto had been with the club since he was 16 years old and was a part of the culture for 10 years.  He was always the guy who came up with a big shot and was a genuinely nice guy when I met him quite a long time ago.   That all changed when NBA player Patrick Mills decided to sign with the Tigers and the team needed to cut someone.  So they went to Corletto and gave him a choice of being released and playing down in lower levels until Mills went back to the NBA or leave the club. 

How is that for loyalty?  He put a decade into the team and they turn around and kick him out for half a season of something better.  Not only that but Corletto told the Herald Sun that "It's got to do with the players when they leave ... they (Tigers officials) try to cover their own backs and make it look like it was the players that were in the wrong and wanted to leave” after the club claimed that he walked out after he wanted more money.  This kind of back stabbery will rear its ugly head later in this piece but to try and smear and a guy like Corletto is very poor work.  I thought that Corletto would have been an excellent companion piece to Mills with Mills’ driving ability opening up more shots for Corletto but I don’t think he minds much anymore as Daryl has since won the NBL Championship with the New Zealand Breakers.

Ayinde Ubaka

There is professionalism and unprofessionalism and then there is what Seamus McPeake did after the Tigers lost to the Gold Coast in January.  The story goes that after the Tigers lost by 13 points McPeake stormed into the players change rooms and furiously cussed at the players about how they were an “embarrassment” while pointing fingers at the team.  He then told Ubaka “to leave and go and find another job” effectively sacking the import on the spot without coach Trevor Gleeson’s and captain Tommy Greer’s knowledge.  After a while Ubaka went to see if he still had a job and unfortunately he had been officially terminated.  I don’t know about you but that is a terrible way to run a business.  The Herald Sun article goes to on to say that Ubaka has the support of the coach and players group but the players were afraid to speak up because they didn’t want to have McPeake’s wrath rain down of them.  Imagine at your workplace where the boss is so unprofessional that if something goes wrong he goes into a rage and sacks people on the spot without any consultation from other players and especially the coach and that the rest of the team were too scared to say anything because they might get sacked as well.  That boggles my mind that he was able to stay on as long as he did because I would hate to work in that environment and it must have put enormous strain on not only the on court team but all the employees of the Tigers from that point onwards.

Trevor Gleeson/Chris Anstey

I get that coaches are fired when the team aren’t going very well and are usually the first person to be blame for a team’s poor performance.  I get that.  What I don’t get is how the Tigers went about removing Trevor Gleeson from his position.  The off season started well with Chris Anstey being named the new Director of Basketball to work with Gleeson in making a competitive team.  So far so good, even if I dislike Anstey with a burning passion but that was mainly for his playing style and attitude so hopefully he can turn a new page in this new role.  He was even quoted in saying “I look forward to working with Trevor”.  Sure, that works. 

Then came the news that Anstey and Gleeson had not spoken at all and something was in the works.  What followed was eerily similar to what happened with Daryl Corletto.  The club started an investigation into Trevor Gleeson to see if he had committed any wrongdoings.  It was becoming clearer and clearer that the Tigers were trying to remove Gleeson from his multiyear contract without having to pay him the remainder of his money.  This went on for some time and it seemed inevitable that Anstey would become the new coach when this business was taken care of.  Luckily for Gleeson no infractions were to be found and were bought out of his contract, ushering in the reign of Anstey in the worst possible way.  What a backwards way to removing a coach and at the same time tarnishing their image even further.  So much for loyalty, stability and all those words that get bandied about but here they are just words and not something that gets put into action very often at The Cage.

What is funny is that all of this could have been solved at the start by sitting Gleeson down and telling him “unfortunately Trevor the club has decided to move in a different direction and we are going to have to let you go.  We thank you for what you have done with this team and we wish you luck in your future endeavours.”  Is that so hard?

The New Logo

This is a very small problem I have with the team but I couldn’t find anywhere else to put it so I’m putting it here.  What is up with the new logo?  It looks like something that could have been done in Microsoft Paint and put together with some clip art lettering.  What was wrong with the old one?  That was good and looked MUCH more professional than this one.  Two thumbs down from this blog.

Old Logo

New Logo

This team needs to pull itself together and quick before the second Melbourne team comes in a steals a fair chunk of their supporters.  If the Tigers do not right their wrongs before the Eastern suburbs team comes into the league don’t look for me at The Cage anytime soon.

Post Season Review - Melbourne

The Season

Started well but then everything went horribly wrong.  By round seven they had a 6-3 record and were going gangbusters behind Patty Mills and Cameron Tragardh and The Cage was selling out as frequently as hotcakes.  Four straight losses had the team falling a bit but made up with it with three wins in a row to be sitting at a respectable 9-6 after round 13.  After that, the wheels fell off and it was a bloodbath.  The Tigers lost six straight before their next win and went 1-5 after that to finish a disappointing fourth last with an 11-17 record.  The last twelve rounds of the season had the team going 2-11 with fingers being pointed everywhere.

What went right?

They had five Dabster Award winners spread out between three players and for the first half of the season Cameron Tragardh was looking MVP worthy.  Patrick Mills brought along the hype and the casual fan as the stadium had a record number of full houses.  Liam Rush continued to grow and Ron Dorsey did something in the second half after his horrid first part of the season.

What went wrong?

It all started in the pre-season as Daryl Corletto was unceremoniously dumped from the team after they signed Mills, something I don’t think he has lost much sleep to after winning the championship.  The saga did put a black mark on the club and especially Seamus McPeake.  Continuing on with McPeake he also sacked Ayinde Ubaka after a loss which garnered plenty of negative press.  It was a stupid move for a guy who seems like he doesn’t care about the people in the club and thankfully he has now been separated from the team. 

On the court their second half was awful as new import Myron Allen tried his best but after a few good games didn’t do much to light the court on fire.  Tragardh went missing while Ron Dorsey didn’t live up to his hype from last season. 

Most Valuable Player

Even though he trailed off badly at the end of the season Cameron Tragardh was the main man for the Tigers.  He can score with the best of them and Melbourne needed that.  He also showed that he could be a leader after being named team captain.  He finished with an ER of 14.6 but was in the league top ten for most of the season.

Targets

With Tragardh defecting to Cairns and only Rush, Dorsey, Lucas Walker and Tom Greer re-signed for the coming season this team is pretty much starting from scratch.  Unfortunately all of their signed players are small forwards/sometime power forwards so the front office is going to have to fill a lot of holes before the coming journey.  Another unfortunate idea is that they are going to have to play some of these players at power forward, meaning if they don’t get a big body (maybe Luke Schenscher?) then the team is going to be very small.  As I have said with all the other teams so far the Tigers are going to need a good import guard to get the offence going and maybe a lights out shooting guard, whether import or local.  It’s pretty much getting any talent that isn’t a small forward at this stage for Melbourne.

Next Season

Unknown at the moment as they need to fill out most of the roster before that time.  Losing Tragardh hurts but if they can get some more talent and hopefully some height in their centre position then it could be a good one.  Right now I have no idea what next season is going to be like for the Melbourne Tigers.

Grade

C

The 2012 NBL Blog “B” Grade NBL Championship

With the finals series underway and an upset in the making the pointy end of the season has started with a bang.  But what about the teams left out of these festivities, why can’t they have some glory.  The NCAA has the NIT and the NBL Dream Team has a minor championship (which I came runners up to in my league), so why can’t the NBL have a second tier trophy for teams to fight over.  As the NBL Finals MVP award is named after Larry Sengstock who won five championships in his career, the minor championship’s MVP award is named after Simon Dwight who took his West Sydney Razorbacks to one game of winning the championship in both 2002 and 2004, the only times the team made it to the finals.

I will be simulating what would happen to this season’s B Grade championship through very complex algorhythms, processed by a supercomputer that can compare to the best technology that the CIA and FBI combined cannot afford.  Or it would have been if I could be bothered, so here is my take.

 This year the B-Finals is sponsored by The NBL Blog who is contributing massive amounts of funding and advertising space for this tournament, please see www.thenblblog.blogspot.com for more details.

The 2012 NBL Blog “B” Grade NBL Championship

(The team on top have home court advantage)

Game 1 - #4 Wollongong Hawks vs. Adelaide 36ers

After their shellacking by the Hawks in the last game of the season, Adelaide wanted revenge.  The Wollongong crowd wanted to keep this season going to honour their retiring hero and the home side got out to a blinder, getting out to a 27-15 first quarter lead behind Oscar Forman who had 12 points on 4/5 shooting from behind the arc.  Luckily for the 36ers it wouldn’t be a repeat of their last meeting, going on a 14-5 run to bring it to within three points, where both teams battled to a draw and at half time the Hawks led 52-49.  The best players so far on each team were Rhys Martin who had 10 points and a whopping 8 assists, while Diamon Simpson was doing it all by himself, racking up 18 first half points to go with 5 rebounds.

In the second half both teams fought gallantly but Adelaide just couldn’t get in front, tying the game twice but never taking the lead.  Stephen Weigh was having a shocker, going 3-14 from the field through three quarters with 4 turnovers.  The third quarter ended with the home side up by five, 67-62.  Starting the fourth the crow-eaters turned on the jets, breaking out a 10-0 run to silence the home side and take the lead behind Daniel Johnson who had finally broken the shackles of Larry Davidson who was now in foul trouble, with rarely used Daniel Jackson having to be used.  The game wasn’t over yet and with three minutes to go Wollongong went on their own run to wrestle the lead back and from there the home side took the game out and lived to see another battle, winning 85-79.

Notable performance (Wollongong) – Rhys Martin: 13 points (5/13 FG), 3 rebounds, 13 assists, 5 turnovers.

Notable performance (Adelaide) – Diamon Simpson: 26 points (11/18 FG), 12 rebounds, 3 blocks.

Game 2 - #1 Cairns Taipans vs. #4 Wollongong Hawks

Doubling up is always tough but going up against a team that was in the proper finals chase is a massive undertaking.  For the Taipans, they wanted to show the league that they are finals material.  Unfortunately for them, Wollongong still had the hot hand and tore through the home side like they were a dead snake.  The Hawks had a massive 24-6 lead with two minutes remaining in the first quarter with veteran Mat Campbell already going to the line six times, making them all.  Andrew Warren was the main culprit as he missed all of his five shots and receiving a spray in a time out from Dusty Rychart, demanding that Jamar Wilson get the ball more as the Taipans’ top scorer not putting a shot up in the whole quarter.  At the first break Wollongong was leading 26-10.

The home crowd was uneasy and with good reason, as Cairns was renowned for a grinding style of play.  They didn’t disappoint in the second and third quarter, outscoring the Hawks by twenty points while keeping the visitors to only 22 points in those two quarters.  After that the Hawks had run out of luck and were steamrolled in the final term, losing to the Taipans by twelve, 76-64.

Notable performance (Cairns) – Alex Loughton: 15 points, 9 rebounds, 4 assists, 3 steals.

Notable performance (Wollongong) – Mat Campbell: 17 points, 5 rebounds.

Game 3 - #2 Melbourne Tigers vs. #3 Sydney Kings

A game between the two biggest cities is always a big deal and with the rambunctious crowd at The Cage it was ramped up to eleven.  The Kings behind Shane Heal were ready to go and showed uncharacteristic ‘mongrel-ness’, winning both the first and second terms to take a fifteen point lead at the half.  Julian Khazzouh was a man among boys, notching up a whopping 12 rebounds to go with his 14 points while Cameron Tragardh was having a stinker, shooting 4-10 while being hamstrung with fouls.  The second half wasn’t much different apart from a small comeback from the Tigers that brought the lead back to single digits but the Kings were just too composed and won the game easily and causing the first upset of the tournament, the final score 80-63.

Notable performance (Melbourne) – Myron Allen: 16 points, 8 rebounds, 6 assists, 7 turnovers.

Notable performance (Sydney) – Julian Khazzouh: 25 points, 15 rebounds, 3 blocks.

The 2012 NBL Blog “B” Grade NBL Championship – Championship Game

Game 4 - #1 Cairns Taipans vs. #3 Sydney Kings

Here it is the massive game that over 10 people will see.  Obviously it is not being telecast on One HD, they would rather show a repeat of the 2005 movie Aeon Flux, starring Charlize Theron that no one will ever see.

But onto the game, the crowd is packed and the teams are raring to go.  Unfortunately most of the energy was nervousness, with both teams making silly plays and taking bad shots, as the first quarter total shows – 12-10.  Yuck.  They opened up a little in the second, with Jamar Wilson hitting two quick three pointers and was fouled in the space of about a minute and a half, pushing the Taipans’ lead out to ten points at the half time break with the score at 47-37.  Julian Khazzouh was being doubled teamed for most of the half, shown by his 2-6 shooting.  He should have heaps of assists if his perimeter players could shoot as they have missed quite a few easy kick out shots that would have had the Kings closer than the score indicates.

The second half started like the second quarter started, with both teams trading baskets until the Kings went on a run behind Ben Madgen who was finally hitting shots that he was missing in the first half and the score was all knotted up before Kerry Williams made a cameo at the buzzer, hitting a half court shot that set the crowd alight.  It would be his only made basket.  Cairns – 66, Sydney – 63. 

The final quarter of both their season’s was electric, with massive shots, hard fouls and a minor scuffle when Aaron Grabau pushed Anatoly Bose out of bounds, causing the rest of the Kings players to fight for him, but after the players were separated it was shown on the replay that Bose had flopped, causing the Cairns crowd to boo him every time he touched the ball for the remainder of the game.  With thirty second left on the clock the score was tied and after coming out of a time out the ball was given to Jamar Wilson who calmly crossed over Luke Martin and drained a mid range floater over the stretched out arms of Jerai Grant with seven seconds on the clock.  Cairns by two.  Another time out ensues, with Sydney drawing up what could be their final shot of the season.  The ball is inbounded by Ben Madgen to Anatoly Bose who dribbled twice, pumped faked and shot over two defenders.  The ball bounced once, twice and rolled out to the left as Cairns pulled off the win 88-86.  The crowd erupts as Bose crumples to the ground while Julian Khazzouh looks to the scoreboard.  Jamar Wilson and Ian Crosswhite are celebrating at midcourt while Aaron Fearne is calmly shaking Shane Heal’s hand before joining in on the party.

Notable performance (Cairns) – Jamar Wilson: 20 points, 4 rebounds, 5 assists.

Notable performance (Sydney) – Ben Madgen: 24 points.

At the podium the Cairns Taipans are awarded their medals while Jamar Wilson was given the Simon Dwight Award for Most Valuable Player.  Congratulations to the Cairns Taipans who have won The 2012 NBL Blog “B” Grade NBL Championship!

Patrick Mills - A Tribute

Everyone and their dog knows that Patrick Mills has been released from the Melbourne Tigers to further his career in China.  While I can see why he made the move I do think that it was a little scummy of him to go so soon.

For one he didn’t separate himself from the rest of the league enough to validate the pre-season hype.  Much like Harry Kewell for the Melbourne Victory who has only one assist and no goals in five games, Mills has failed to live up to his reputation of being unguardable and ‘NBA worthy’.  His numbers of 18.6 points and 5.0 assists are in the top level of the NBL but for someone who played in 64 games for the Portland Trailblazers they aren’t that impressive.  People expected Patty to put up 30 points a game and would light the world on fire.  Starting out he had numerous games of subpar shooting and his first three games he had more turnovers than assists.  Luckily for him his play improved with a 32 point game and three games with eight assists or more but he left before the naysayers could be shut up with his play.  42% from the field and 29% from three is just not good enough for any NBA player in the NBL.

However, the main reason why I am a little miffed is that after all this hoopla over Patrick Mills coming down from the NBA to help out his home country and the sport that needs a shot in the arm was extremely anti-climactic.  The first game of the season was sold out and there was a buzz in the air that was louder than the last decade of basketball but after two months that buzz has fizzled and Mills has lost his sheen and people are starting to turn.  Also, I feel like the Daryl Corletto saga was for nothing and the Tigers organisation will need to try hard to win back loyal fans now they have nothing to show for the jettison of Corletto. 

But at the end of the day Patty Mills has to look out for Patty Mills first.  He is only 23 years old and if he is getting paid the reported $1.25 million that is very hard to pass up for a low ranking league such like the NBL.  On the Xinjiang Guanghui Flying Tigers (which is a killer name by the way) there are notable names like Kenyon Martin and Quincy Douby with the league including players such as Stephon Marbury, Aaron Brooks, Wilson Chandler, Dan Gadzuric, JR Smith and Yi Jianlian.  No doubt he will get better exposure and a bigger challenge and combined with the uncertainty of the NBA contract situation where there is no guarantee that Mills will get a contract in the new NBA I can understand why he made this decision.

All is not lost for the Tigers as the shots that will be freed from Mills’ departure will mostly go to Ayinde Ubaka and Ron Dorsey so if you are needing someone on your Dream Team side then look for these two imports to improve their 9.1 and 8.3 ER respectively.  I believe that the Tigers’ play won’t drop off that much and neither will the overall impact of the NBL.  Sure Mills gave a huge boost but he didn’t back it up and so the public interest waned.  If Andrew Bogut is recruited then that is a different kettle of fish altogether...

Did the Tigers go too early?

 "If we're not playing games in October, I wouldn't be shocked to see an exodus.”  NBA free agent Shane Battier.

Let’s fast forward to October 2011 and the NBA still isn’t playing basketball and the players are getting antsy.  Their millions of dollars are dwindling after their tenth Mercedes Benz and A-List party and they need somewhere to just play basketball.  Insert Australia coming into summer with its babes, beaches and basketball that is a very tempting location for some off season practice.  There are no spots open in Europe or cash heavy China because all of the blue chip NBA players have snagged them and the lesser players are left out in the cold looking for some warmth.  Can you imagine Sydney running around with Chris Kaman or Ben Gordon suiting up for Townsville?  Older players who have made their money who still want to contribute to a team and maybe relive their prime in another place or young upstarts like Jerai Grant who want to showcase their skills to move on to greener pastures would be ideal to target as the competition wouldn’t have to be elite, just a place to keep their body in shape and get a little ego boost in the process.

But where does the Melbourne Tigers fit as they have already filled their import quota with Ron Dorsey and Ayinde Ubaka?  In any other year those two would be top flight guys to build a team around but with the looming cancellation of the NBA season will it be enough to send the team to the Promised Land?

I don’t think so.  This lockout is a once in a lifetime opportunity as it could possibly keep players out for a whole season.  What will the players do when they can’t play NBA basketball from October to June?  Like everyone else they need a constant salary and even though the NBL’s pay packet is only a fraction of their usual income it at least keeps them in game shape and puts food on the table.  How big would basketball be in Sydney if they can get a semi-household name like Josh Smith or Kendrick Perkins?  Looking back on the 2008-2009 season when the South Dragons won the title the insertion of Donta Smith sent shockwaves through the whole city.  Now people were talking about basketball.  There were more young women going to games to get a look at this ‘big black guy’ as one of my female friends called him because he was new and exciting.  Getting someone who can energise the league and bring excitement to the game like Smith did is within reach of the teams who want to take the chance.

Melbourne has shot themselves in the foot and the worst part is that it isn’t their fault.  They didn’t know that the NBA may be locked out for the entire season.  I will be barracking for them only because the Dragons folded but wouldn’t it be crazy if during the season they release either Dorsey or Ubaka and sign Carmelo Anthony.  Likely?  No way.  The best thing that would ever happen to this game?  Absolutely.