Episode 52 – Bowling Week and Bad Jazz

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Christmas Season Status as been officially changed from “Right Around the Corner” to “Practically Here” at the Utah SportsCast, so we figured it was about time to do a little shopping for some of our favorite local sports figures. We made a list of everyone we talked about this year, and what we thought they would either like or need. Some of the gifts were pretty easy to find (a box of tissues for Larry H. Miller, for example, or an English-Portuguese dictionary for Freddy Adu), but the others proved a bit more challenging. Here are some of the highlights:

We started our holiday gift giving with the Utah Jazz, and Jerry Sloan was first. For Christmas he will receive Long Overdue Kudos, for producing one of the most remarkable careers a head coach has ever had in the NBA. There is a curious reluctance among basketball insiders to give Coach Sloan credit for his body of work. It is often mentioned that he has never won an NBA Championship as a head coach, although plenty of others have won awards like Coach of the Year without the hardware.

When USA Basketball used to change head coaches in the 20^th Century, it was always the previous team’s first assistant that was given a chance at the helm. Remember who had come up through that system and was due to coach the national team when they decided to disregard the long-standing accolade and just give it to Mike Krzyzewski? Does anyone believe USA Basketball would have made such a drastic change if the next coach had been Phil Jackson or Pat Riley, instead of Jerry Sloan? Incidentally, how many NBA Championships has Coach K won as a head coach? A little respect from the national media will do a lot of good for Coach Sloan this year.

Next on the list is Andrei Kirilenko, and we are giving him a Reliable Jumpshot for Christmas (or whatever they celebrate in Russia). This is basically the only thing AK really needs as a basketball player, as his lessons with Jeff Hornacek do not seem to have borne fruit yet. We want to give him a little jumpstart, and turn Kirilenko into that third offensive option the Jazz desperately need.

For Matt Harpring we would like to offer him a free Turning Back of the Clock. Of all the problems Harpring has dealt with this year, the most pressing seems to be the slow, steady creep of his odometer. Perhaps an extra year or two (kind of similar to what the NCAA does for medically ineligible athletes) would heal a lot of persistent pains and rejuvenate the hardest working man on the team.

Paul Millsap is next, and for him we have picked Four More Inches of Height. Millsap is a talented, strong, and determined player who can be very good for an NBA team, preferably the Jazz. However, being just a little bit taller would take him to another level. Do you think he comes up with some amazing rebounds and unbelievable blocks now? Wait until he is as tall as Dwight Howard. We almost gave him a Great Nickname as his Christmas gift, but we thought he could make good use of the height upgrade now, and save that for another year.

For the BYU Football team we began with Bronco Mendenhall. This was an obvious choice, and something we know he really wants. We would like to give Coach Mendenhall A Few More Non-Conference Wins as his Christmas gift. The conference hasn’t been a problem for the last few years, and he seems to have t...