two dolla

no more trading without my approval

I want to move out of Minnesota. It’s really just for sports-related reasons, but still. I think it’s a valid excuse.

The Timberwolves trade everyone to Boston.

The Twins let one of my top three favorite players go to another team, and try to trade another one of my top three favorite players to any other team that will offer them something.

The Vikings. Well, whatever. They’re the Vikings.

And now the Lynx are rumored to be trading Lindsey Harding. This is where I draw the line.

Harding was the first pick overall in the WNBA draft last season and has been trying to engineer a trade to the Comets ever since.

She went to high school in Houston (where the Comets play), so I can kinda understand that. I don’t like it, but I understand the logic behind it.

Harding for one of the Comets’ centers and their 5th pick in this year’s draft sounds like a good deal, but it’s Lindsey Harding. LINDSEY HARDING.  Our options, if this should go past just a rumor, would be Sancho Lyttle or Michelle Snow. Sancho has an awesome name; Michelle DUNKS.

When we hung out she gave me her autograph during a post-game fan appreciation type thing, she was super nice. She wasn’t one of those scribble-scribble-next type of autograph-signing players (no, my most favorite player had to pull that shit!); she was all, "hey, thanks for coming. Here you go. Thanks again. You’re awesome." (maybe not the last part, but still.) Stuff like that really resonates with fans in a terrific way. ESPECIALLY ME. Now that I know she’s wanted to play in Houston since she was drafted, I may be a little less of a gigantic fan, though.

Sports make me all emo nowadays. I need to go back to work, so I can have real grown up things to want to slit my wrists about and not who’s going to be playing point guard for the Lynx during the first year I have season tickets.

respect would earn some fans

There’s a certain women’s national sports association that, within the past year or so, I’ve really started to love and support. There was so much support, in fact, that I decided to buy season tickets for the 2008 season of this said organization. I’ve been reading and intermittently posting on a message board that has to do with this team, and noticed over the past few months, that other season ticket holders seemed to bitch and moan a lot about what they did and didn’t receive by being season ticket holders. I kinda rolled my eyes every time I read something about it, figuring they were bitching about nothing. Little did I know.

Last week’s free Timberwolves tickets that ended up being not-really-tickets in a suite? An email went out to all season ticket holders and the first few people that replied got two free tickets. I responded back in less than ten seconds. Seriously. What the hell else do you think I do all day long while applying for jobs? I check email. It was only later I found out the details on the tickets. So, well, I passed on them. Plus, standing for two to three hours with no more monthly chiropractor visits until I get insurance again doesn’t really sound like a pleasant experience for anyone involved.

There was a promotion going on when I bought my season tickets. It involved being a first time season ticket holder that purchase the tickets in August. For those that met those qualifications, you got to have dinner and watch a Wolves game with one of the most amazing players on the team. I even confirmed this with the season ticket lady back in August, and she told me someone would get in touch with me. As you can guess, that didn’t happen.

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lynx season closer

This evening’s Lynx game was the last one of the 2007 season. The Lynx kicked ass, though, and Erica once again hooked me up with seats – this time courtside, and I do mean courtside. The local cameraman and his awesome cord-holding guy were the only thing between us and the court. Stephanie and I tried to keep our grossly inappropriate comments to a minimum, since we were sitting in the fancy seats.

After the game, the players signed autographs. Why, yes, I am a nerd and, yes, I did wait in line to get as many autographs as I could in 20 minutes. And we also stood outside the door to high five the team headed back into the locker room.

I was gigantic nerd, and am still feeling gigantically nerdy about the entire game/post-game activities. The Lynx turned out to be incredibly awesome to watch this year, despite a less than stellar record, and I really can’t wait to see who we land in the 2008 draft. With Lindsey Harding back to full strength for next season, and Seimone Augustus still as awesome as ever, anyone we can snag will make an awesome addition to the team.

Now I have to find a big enough frame to hold the autographed “Go Lynx!” sign that I now have in my possession. I don’t have my dream basement yet, that’ll be covered from floor to ceiling with autographed posters and game-worn jerseys, so my hallway might just have to work for now.

talking about the lynx is a happy thing

Tonight is the next to last Lynx game I’ll get to go to before the season ends. That pretty much makes me sad, but knowing that I’ve already got a seat reserved for the 2008 season via a season ticket makes me a little bit happier.

Kathrin Ress, our second-string center, played her last game while I was in the midst of Baseball Road Trip 2007. She’s now listed as Suspended, which isn’t as seriously as it sounds, considering she’s just going overseas to start practicing with the Italian National Team. The 2007 season was Kathrin’s rookie season, and she finally started to step it up a notch or two towards the end of the season. While the Lynx aren’t exactly contending for a spot in the playoffs, it’s still a shame to pull someone out of the rotation that’s finally starting to gel.

This afternoon, the Lynx re-signed Megan Duffy for the rest of the season. She’s already been let go by the team once this year, and played a couple of pre-season games with the L.A. Sparks before being let go there, too. Megan will take over Kathrin’s spot on the roster, but being only 5’7″ means she probably won’t be seeing too much time backing up the center position. It’s good to have another somewhat experienced point guard on hand, but it also makes me feel a little uneasy about who’ll be giving Nicole Ohlde a break throughout the game.

I’m pretty excited for the game tonight, because I’m going to see if I can actually get the seat where I’ll be sitting next year at every game.

Am I a nerd? Yes, but you knew that.

lynx win 78-73

Because there isn’t a TV station around that’ll televise WNBA games on a regular basis, I’m listening to the Lynx/Monarchs game through WNBA.com. It’s been a while since I’ve watched a basketball game on TV, and I don’t remember ever listening to one on the radio. I’m not sure who the announcer is on this game; I just know that I envy his career. These are my favorite sports cliches he’s used so far:

• Oh, it’s all cotton now!
• The officiating crew not exactly on top of it tonight.
• Let’s play a little game called “Which is the home team?” (because the officiating is once again shit.)
• You’ve got to be kidding me.
• You’re going to call a ticky-tack foul. That is a bad call.
• Minnesota isn’t able to do anything without the whistling being blown.
• And during a radio break? “For more information, call lynxbasketball.com.”
• Be proud of the Lynx tonight! (Oh, hell, yes, I always am!)

I hate hate hate blaming officiating for anything that goes wrong in any sporting event, because it just seems like a cop out for a team that maybe hasn’t played very hard or maybe threw away some last minute opportunities.

With the final tally being 25 fouls by the Lynx and only 15 by the Monarchs, it just seem fishy. If you take into consideration that probably five of those fouls were called in the last two minutes when the Monarchs were trying to send the Lynx to the free throw line and save some points, it becomes even more questionable. It it were maybe 10 fouls by Kristen Mann and the other 15 by Vanessa Hayden, then I might believe it – but it doesn’t work that way when one of those two people isn’t even playing this year. Luckily, the Monarchs were entirely off their free-throw shooting game, or we would have lost the game based on trips to the charity stripe*. And it wouldn’t have been the first time.

WHEW. Go Lynx. Two in a row. Keep it up, yo.

On another note, Tuesday is the last day of our 3rd quarter at work. Normally, I’d roll with it. But I just really wanted to go to the Lynx Go Pink event that evening.

*I had to throw in one sports-related cliche from my newspaper writing days.

i’m kinda in love

You may not have noticed this yet (like if you’ve been living under a rock), but I kinda love the Minnesota Lynx a lot.

Back in the day, I used to love the Chicago Bulls. A whole lot. During the 1991 NBA season (my freshman year of high school), I would stay the night at my friend Angie’s house, especially when the Bulls were on TV. Our plans would revolve around a basketball game, and we’d keep track of points, rebounds, assists, and fouls by using tick marks on a piece of wide-ruled notebook paper. I even had specific paper folders designated strictly for my score-keeping. I was high tech. And nerdy.

Then, I graduated from high school, and did things like work a ridiculous amount of hours, leaving me no time to watch all the Bulls game that were broadcast on WGN, with Johnny “Red” Kerr and the other guy’s name that I could never remember.

We’d also made the hour and a half drive from my hometown to Kansas City to watch baseball games all the time as a kid, and then I started getting into it a little heavier in 2001 or so. When I moved to Minnesota in 2003, I was very excited to be that close to any professional sports team and immediately loved the Twins. And I still do.

But then I hit a Lynx game with Erica last year and things haven’t quite been the same.

Today, I read about the WNBA player eligibility (other than having a cooch), their salary scale, and I would have read the WNBA Collective Bargaining Agreement, but the link I found didn’t work. I studied the draft for each of the past five years and read through a good two dozen Wikipedia entries pertaining to the league. I seriously think I’m in love.

I know I’m too attached to the Lynx, though, when I read through a local message board and someone goes off on a tirade about my favorite player saying she doesn’t bring anything to the team. #1) Yes, she does! and #2) Right now, there’s nobody that’s bringing anything to the team, considering we’ve lost 10 games in a row. But it’s a building year (or something), so I’m not too down about it. There’s no need to be.

And I can always look at these pictures, which are ones the players have taken themselves and absolutely make me crack up every time, mainly because it makes the players look like real people, instead of all over-the-top with their own privates jets and 8-figure salary. (Hello, run-on sentence.)

I was going absolutely nowhere with this post; I was just writing it as I uploaded and edited the pictures I’d taken from the past three games (07/03, 07/08, and 07/20) I’ve watched. Tomorrow night, the Sparks are in town, and right now they’re only a few games ahead of us in the standings. That means more pictures, more basketball, and a couple more hours of kinda my favorite thing in the world right now.

And maybe some nachos.

how about a random list

• Please go do a little bidding action for the Boob Ha Ha if you haven’t already. I have my eye on a couple of the photographs, because I still don’t have anything on my walls except shelves and a smashed mosquito.
• If Clay Aiken put his foot on my armrest mid-flight, I don’t know if I’d shove him. But I may break his ankle. Clay and I are over. For real this time.
• You know when there’s 2 minutes left in a basketball game and the home team is home by 13 or so? That’s not an appropriate time to leave if you’re sitting close to the court and there are people behind you that want to watch the whole game. Sit your asses down and wait until the final buzzer. There’s not that much traffic to beat, okay?
• The “roving maintenance” crew is supposed to be power washing my air conditioners today. Yeah, I don’t know either. I just know I had to move a bunch of furniture and now my apartment is in shambles.
• Work? Eww. I’m just sayin’.
• My new computer has Vista, and I don’t really hate it. I even kinda like it.
• Only three days until I hop a plane for St. Louis and send my dog to the babysitter once again. You have no idea how happy it makes me that Riley loves his babysitter a lot. Do you need one in the Twin Cities area? Use Canine Caretaker; you will not be sorry. His picture’s on their website even.

you’re welcome!

When the Minnesota Lynx win, the entire time usually circles around center court and dances to “Apache” by the Sugarhill Gang.

Here’s a very poorly shot video (by me) of them doing it a couple of weeks ago:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5SwBhK7hE4[/youtube]

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i love the lynx a lot

Know what my favorite thing is right now? Lynx basketball. I forgot how much I loved basketball until sitting just a few rows up from courtside the past few games. When Kevin Garnett is five rows in front of me, or when I can read the rough drafts of what the media is putting together as a story, it’s hard not to like being that close to the action.

I love that it’s a professional sport where women are actually playing the game. I love that it takes places in an actual huge venue (in the Lynx case, it’s the Target Center) and not some generic half-size arena. I love that the crowd really gets into every play. I love that the players sitting on the bench get so excited during the game that they can barely sit down.

I love all the players. Seimone Augustus is an incredible player with extraordinary talent, but yet she seems so humble during every game that you’d never think she was the Rookie of the Year last year and leads the league in scoring as of right now. I love Lindsey Harding, not only because we got a hell of a deal in the draft by snatching her up, but because she plays like she’s been a pro for years and has more assists than anyone else in the league. I love Kristen Mann for a lot of reasons – she plays like she’s taller than 6’1″, she’s physical as hell, and she can drain a three-pointer just as easy as she can a free throw. I love the rest of the team, too.

I thought before the season that I should have just grabbed up a season ticket, because I would end up going to all of the games anyway. Next year, I definitely am. Friday’s game will be my fourth game this season, and anytime I’m in town on the day of a game, I’m going.

Here are my pictures from Saturday’s game, and my favorites are here:

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