First we lose the greatest coach to ever grace a college basketball sideline this month. John Wooden is probably so disgusted with the sport that he made popular in the 60's and 70's. How can anybody be happy with what just transpired last night? I know for the past few years now any child 19 years and older has gone pro. Most of them have been ready to go and have succeeded. Kevin Durant is about to re-write the record books and become a championship caliber player. Greg Oden is going to be a star one day. Even if it is for one season, he is going to lead a team to a title. Tarik Evans and Derek Rose will be all stars one day and if Micheal Beasley can get his head right, he will be great too. College basketball has become a joke. Every high school kid who has talent to play in the NBA will go to college for one semester and then play his season and then go pro. They will take basic English and Math and in the second semester they will take a hike for they know that they are not going to back to school under any circumstance. Everyone knows this and i am probably the last one to comment on this topic. Last night all of the top 10 players drafted I believe are under the age of 21. In fact none of the players were even pre-season all americans before last season. The saddest thing that happened is when the Utah Jazz drafted that kid from Butler, he was booed. This kid helped lead his team to the final game and within 2 points of winning a national championship and the crowd booed him? There are sooooo many things wrong with that i am saddened too comment. First when a mid major school has a lottery pick, we should all be rejoicing and hopeful that he is going to stay in college for four years. Instead he opted to go pro as a sophomore. That is telling since no mid major players ever are lottery picks. I think that Wally Sczerbiak is the only one in recent years. Micheal Olawakandi could be considered one too. (and we know what kind of career he had). If you look at the draft there are players from Fresno St., Baylor, and Butler all drafted in the first round. Where are the Dukies? Only one Tar Heel? Kansas had a couple and so did Kentucky but does anybody know any of these players? I am okay with new people, i am okay with the cycles of talent and the talent pool being pretty shallow, but don't tell me that these players are the future of the NBA. John Wall is a special talent but he wasn't even his leagues most valuable player or freshman.
So what is my outrage if we expect all of these thing you may ask? My outrage is why do we let these kids go to college if they are only going to go to class for a semester? The Universities are all being punished for poor graduation rates and losing scholarship money for other programs within the school. we know that most universities these days are getting richer because of their sport teams and not because of academics. So why not let a kid go pro out of high school and be done with it. Many people cannot afford to go to college or cannot make three point shots. Why not create more full scholarships for academics and not only for athletics? I am shocked that that practice has not been screamed at by schools across the country. I know that people will say that without the success of the teams, the schools would not have the money for scholarships for anybody, but these kids are going to class for a semester and earning 10-20 million dollars for the school so no one is going to complain because it is free money!!!! Now the Mid Majors are doing it. I think a guy from Nevada went in the 1st round. Pretty soon there will be a 15 year old prodigy who is both athletic and smart and is 7'1. They are telling kids even now that if you don't want to go to class, go play in Europe.
So good bye Dickie V. You are the last of a dying breed. No more diaper dandies and ptper's. I will still watch March Madness. They are already expanding the tournament so there is no special teams anymore. Actually, now that I think of it I think I much rather play basketball myself...
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