panthera leo fututio

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Date	Title	Body
2 weeks 3 days ago	Don't you goddamn dare,	Don't you goddamn dare, AIRBHG
4 weeks 4 days ago	My first reaction:	Will they still call it Midnight Madness? I'm an idiot.
5 weeks 1 day ago	It reminds me of the classic	It reminds me of the classic Kids in the Hall sketch "The Home Run", except, you know, marginally more wholesome. (relevant bit starts @ 1:50)
6 weeks 4 hours ago	Not a fan of Lawrence Lessig?	Not a fan of Lawrence Lessig? (Point being that many people would consider the common practice of congressmen transitioning into lobbyists to be a very big and very harmful deal. I do think the analogy to this NCAA/Auburn case is pretty apt.)
6 weeks 1 day ago	I don't think we should be	I don't think we should be expecting Burke to turn into Chris Paul in the pros, but he's really not that far off physically. Looking at Paul's draft combine measurables (http://www.draftexpress.com/profile/Chris-Paul-14/), I'd actually expect to see Burke measure out very similarly in terms of height/length, speed, lane agility, vertical, and strength.  I think Paul has really outsdanding lateral quickness, which might not necessarily show up in the lane agility drill, but I also think that his hands make him seem a lot more explosive than he actually is, both off the dribble and on defense.
6 weeks 3 days ago	But Paul doesn't, nor does	But Paul doesn't, nor does Lowry or Jameer Nelson or Maurice Williams or DJ Augustin. The point is that there are many guys who have been anywhere from serviceable to HOF with comparable physical tools.
6 weeks 3 days ago	Size and speed are nice, but	Size and speed are nice, but there are numerous NBA points with similar physical makeups to Burke who range from serviceable (Kyle Lowry) to good (Andre Miller) to great (Tony Parker, Chris Paul). None of those guys have elite athleticism, all are 6'2" or shorter, and all get by primarily by being good at basketball. Which Trey Burke is. Also, I think you might have a misconception of what teams are expecting in the 6-13 draft pick range. Look through prior years' drafts -- getting a solid starter here is really what you're hoping for.
6 weeks 3 days ago	Expectations for stardom	I absolutely agree with this. Once you get to the bottom half of the lottery, I think most teams would be very pleased to get a guy who turns into a solid but unspectacular starter. Just looking at the last few lotteries, you see a bunch of point/combo guards who don't nearly have the tools to be superstars -- Brandon Knight, Kemba Walker, Damian Lillard, Austin Rivers, etc. I think Burke compares favorably to that group.
6 weeks 3 days ago	Morris might be a bad example	He's actually had every opportunity to establish a role with the Lakers (injury to Nash, injuries to/horribleness of Blake and Duhon), but he's been pretty bad offensively in all the minutes he's gotten. Granted, part of that might be the system he's in, but he just hasn't looked like an NBA point guard, and I'm not sure that additional time in college would have changed that.
8 weeks 1 day ago	Attractiveness of a UCLA job	Whatever the culture of expectations and the current dysfunction of the program at UCLA, it seems to me that it really ought to be one of the easiest places to recruit to in the country. There's the historical aspect, but the combination of UCLA's campus/climatic/lady-in-tiny-shorts beauty, its academic strength, a newly renovated Pauly right on campus, and the general cultural draw of LA would also have to make recruiting pitches much easier, especially given the number of high-caliber players that come out of Southern Cal. Also, there seems (to me anyway) to be a very distinct lingering cultural presence of John Wooden, which has to appeal to Right Way coaches/players.
9 weeks 4 days ago	Statistical noise	How is MSU fandom like anomolously high bowel cancer mortality rates? Measured over small populations, they're both most likely the product of statistical noise: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/oct/28/bad-science-diy-data-analysis
10 weeks 5 days ago	I think that the decrease in	I think that the decrease in offensive efficiency under a 25-second clock would be great enough to lead to a net decrease in scoring, even with the added possessions. At the college level, I just don't see there being enough guys who can consistently generate quality shots out of nothing to make the short clock work.
11 weeks 2 days ago	If feasible, I think someone	If feasible, I think someone ought to photoshop a chihuahua-holding Mesko into this.
15 weeks 4 days ago	I dunno	As a UCLA grad student, I didn't go to any football games this year because Pasadena is far, man. And granted, my loyalties lie elsewhere and there's a big difference between graduate and undergraduate student perceptions, but I get the strong feeling that people on campus give much less of a shit about football here than they might elsewhere, and I have to think that the stadium's location is part of that.
15 weeks 6 days ago	Whoops	Replied on my phone to message that seems not to exist. Carry on.
16 weeks 5 days ago	I dispute your premise, sir	These quotes are a manifestation of panning out. Marques Slocum, his fuck lion, and Carla will forever live in the pantheon of Michigan men (and women and fuck lions).
16 weeks 5 days ago	Wait, so are you implying	Wait, so are you implying that LeBron isn't a better on-ball defender than any college player who has ever lived? If so, you might want to rethink your line of reasoning.
16 weeks 5 days ago	Given his ability to create	Given his ability to create off the dribble, size, and the likely defensive struggles he's going to have in the NBA, I think a decent player comparison for Stauskas might actually be Jamal Crawford. Crawford's a good bit quicker, but I think Stauskas might be able to play a similar role as a designated scorer off the bench.
16 weeks 5 days ago	A few things in McGary's favor	He has pretty legit size for an NBA 4, and even though he's old for a freshman, this is probably his first year in a really advanced strength program, so I imagine his body still has plenty of developing to do. Also, he shows really good instincts with things like outlet passing, he has a great motor, and he has great per-minute rebounding numbers. I'd be surprised if he was ever an all star, but I wouldn't be shocked at all to seem him stick in the league for a while.
18 weeks 1 day ago	Nothing is fucked here, Dude.	Nothing is fucked here, Dude. -Pat Forde
18 weeks 2 days ago	Still less embarrassing than Freekbass.	Still less embarrassing than Freekbass.
18 weeks 3 days ago	On my phone, the only app	On my phone, the only app that I really couldn't do without is Google Reader. On my tablet, I also use EZPDF Reader (really good for reading and annotating journal articles) and the Kindle app quite a bit. On both phone and tablet, I use Google Play for music, along with the gmail app, MGoBlog, Facebook, etc.
18 weeks 4 days ago	I was about to type the same	I was about to type the same thing, but you said it much better than I would have. I think you're exactly right. Your first sentence definitely holds, though; this was a really great piece by Seth.
18 weeks 4 days ago	I don't think we disagree	About a third of motor vehicle deaths in the US involve a driver with above-legal BAC. These deaths still, though, accrue to driver failings of judgment, perception, and reaction. Widespread automation, I would think, stands to reduce motor vehicle deaths involving both sober and drunk drivers. This is especially true when you think of what it might mean for the price and availability of taxis, as well as other systemic factors that would reduce the incidence of people driving themselves when they absolutely should not be driving themselves.
18 weeks 4 days ago	In terms of sharpening one's	In terms of sharpening one's mind, I think you'll agree that the effect of technology depends on how it's applied/consumed. I probably err in reasoning from my own experience too generally, but I maintain that I grapple with serious and varied ideas much more in the current technological environment than I would in an environment without Google Reader in bathroom stalls. Looking at likely more popular activities, is the average American duller now than she would be in the absence of Angry Birds and texting and all the rest of our stream of modern informational/sensory inputs? Maybe, maybe not, but it doesn't strike me as intuitively likely, and I'd need to see actual systematic evidence to be convinced. While I'm probably extrapolating too broadly based on my experience of actually reading worthwhile things on my phone, I think you're almost certainly making too much of the guy who cut you off. Yes, driver alerts and autonomous features need to be carefully designed to avoid causing the sort of behavior you describe, but there's no question at all that they have the ability to supplement/replace our driving performance in vastly preferable ways. Our failings behind the wheel certainly include drowsy, drunk, and distracted driving, but they by no means end there. Our perceptions and reactions are limited in myriad ways, in terms of our field of vision; our limitation to the visual spectrum of light, compromised as it might be by weather or lack of daylight; our ability to precisely discern distance, velocity, and acceleration; our ability to mentally process the unexpected; and our ability to react quickly and in precisely appropriate ways. All of these failings kill people. That information/automation technologies offer the likelihood of helping us kill fewer people is, as far as I can tell, beyond dispute.
18 weeks 5 days ago	I disagree pretty strenuously	I disagree pretty strenuously with respect to progressively advanced information/automation systems in cars. On our own, we're pretty awful at correctly perceiving and responding to things at highway speeds and distances, and these failings are primarily responsible for the 30k+ who are killed in cars domestically every year. Technological improvements have real potential to meaningfully reduce this number, which ought to be seen by everyone as unacceptably high. As to mental atrophy in the face of ubiquitous computation: you'll have a hard time convincing me that my smart phone makes me think less when I'm standing in lines. More generally, I think it's mistaken to think that living amdist computational sophistication will somehow crowd out the thinking that we do on our own.
18 weeks 6 days ago	Another thing that doesn't matter:	Kyle Singler's career.
19 weeks 1 day ago	Did you watch the first 39?	Did you watch the first 39?
19 weeks 1 day ago	To anyone who claims that the NBA sucks	I refer you to Michigan State vs Iowa.
20 weeks 1 day ago	Seeing LeVert handle the ball	Seeing LeVert handle the ball last night made me feel a lot better about (likely) losing Burke next year. He looked plenty strong enough with his dribble to break pressure/set up an offense, and, as happy as I am to have both of them, I'm glad that LeVert will be an option alongside Spike and Walton.

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