WATERCOOLER CHAT: BASEBALL ALL STAR WEEK, BIG 3 IN MIAMI
BASEBALL
It’s All-Star week in baseball, and you know what that means: Home Run Derby. Oddly, the player heading into the Derby with the most home runs in the current seasons has NEVER won the derby. Quite strange. This season hosted a ton of big bats: Matt Holliday, Corey Hart, Hanley Ramirez, among many others. But the victor was an unlikely candidate. David Ortiz of the Boston Red Sox took the prize with 11 homers in the final round. This is wild because Ortiz started this season absolutely terrible. Many rumors had him leaving Boston, so to win the Derby might just keep him in town.
BASKETBALL
And in the NBA, after setting up a mega-powerhouse, the Miami Heat needed to make sure that Bosh/Wade/LeBron had someone to play with. Well, they kept a stellar rebounder in Udonis Haslem, signing him to a multi-year contract AND brought in sharp-shooter Mike Miller from Washington Wizards. Miller is the perfect role player. He hits a 3 when he needs to, and can play decent defense when called upon. If this juggernaut does in fact make a championship run, Miller and Haslem will be key components.
Finally, the Big 3 in Miami are now starting to respond to some of the backlash against them. First of all, Chris Bosh said that they may be the Yankees of basketball right now (because of their star power), but he doesn’t care if nobody likes it. He said, “We like it, and that’s all that matters.” Then, Dwayne answered reports criticizing LeBron for not “doing it himself” (meaning win a championship). Wade told reporters to check the reports, “Nobody has done it by themselves — not Jordan, Magic, or Bird. They all had help”. And technically he’s right. Jordan had Pippen and Rodman, Magic had Kareem and James Worthy, and Bird had McHale and Parish. This Miami experiment is going to be purely fascinating to watch.
