Milwaukee Bucks Blog - The Bob Boozer Jinx : Jimmy Page

Mad Ants! Bucks change D-League affiliates; Charlie Bell in Africa; Led Zeppelin Olympics video

J.D. Mo — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 22:18:00 GMT

NBA.com reported this week that the Bucks have switched Development League teams, losing their affiliation with the Tulsa 66ers when the team was purchased by the Oklahoma City Thunder (yep, that's officially the Supersonics' new name -- apparently the Seattle-fleeing cowboys weren't too impressed with the Bob Boozer Jinx proposal, the Rawhides).

The Bucks will now send their 1st and 2nd year players to Fort Wayne, Indiana, where they'll join the invasion of ...

The Mad Ants.

"Ants are ants" ... "NOT these ants."

The Fort Wayne Mad Ants, also the affiliate of the Detroit Pistons and Indiana Pacers, are promoting last year's D-League star Bucks guard Ramon Sessions with the Bucks switch but Ramon won't be anywhere near that picnic. Rookie small forward Luc Mbah a Moute, the Bucks 2nd round pick, might do some time as a Mad Ant and it's possible 1st round pick Joe Alexander could find himself in the D-League if Mbah a Moute is more NBA-ready at this point (don't scoff -- if Alexander doesn't find his game, no reason to keep in Milwaukee). In either case (and it would be one or the other to Fort Wayne but not both) it does appear that being a Mad Ant would be a lot more fun than sitting on the bench in Milwaukee ...

The NBA's Basketball Without Borders Africa kicked off yesterday (Sept. 3) in Johannesberg, South Africa as NBA players, including Bucks guard Charlie Bell and Racine native Caron Butler of the Washington Wizards, toured the city's Apartheid Museum and visited an AIDS hospice. Today, the sixth annual Africa camp -- a Special Olympics camp -- opened and the players rolled out the pill, with former Buck and NBA hall of famer Bob "the Dobber" Lanier, now special assistant to NBA commissioner David Stern, doing the honors.

Here's Charlie doing something that wouldn't be allowed around the lions at the Milwaukee Zoo.

Notice that he's not quite touching the lion cub, though it's apparently well fed and deeply sleeping ... but that's still good work, Charlie. How often does anyone get to sneak in on a sleeping lion?

I have a feeling Charlie's role as Michael Redd's back-up will be more expansive this season than last. I foresee trouble ahead between coach Scott Skiles and Redd, who's not one to warm up to the concepts of team play or defense. Charlie should get some opportunities, and with Richard Jefferson and Joe Alexander on hand he won't be called on to play small forward as much as he was last season.

Last season was a forgettable one for Bell, as then-GM Larry Harris neglected Bell's contract negotiations but then surprised him by matching the free agent offer he received from the Miami Heat. Despite not being too happy about being a Buck and mired in a season-long shooting slump, Bell's defense and toughness earned him minutes under coach Larry Krystkowiak and will probably impress Skiles, too. He is a Flintstone, after all. Look for Charlie to have a solid, productive comeback in 2008-09.

******************************

The British did the world a fine thing by commissioning Led Zeppelin guitarist and maestro Jimmy Page to compose its London 2012 presentation for the Beijing Olympics closing ceremony. The eight-minute piece - which featured Page, singer Leona Lewis and a reworked version of "Whole Lotta Love" - created quite a buzz all over the planet and earned a thumbs up from the toughest of critics -- Led Zeppelin fans, who were more than a little anxious about how it would come off. Page called it as "a wonderful, compact statement of why we're all here, which is London '12"; and raved about Lewis, describing the staging as "so her, so classy" and her vocals "dazzling."

And if there are any lingering doubts about how cool it was to Zeppelin-ize the Olympics, check out this video montage put together by Zep fan Videofleet. Beijing, basketball and Led Zeppelin! Brilliant!!!

I'd watch that vid a second time before scrolling down further ...

Someone sent me a picture a few days ago

in my email

and

I've been trying hard

forget it

ever since.

On second thought (well, it won't load to the site for some reason) ... it seems the basketball gods have conspired with the Led Zeppelin gods to ensure your unfettered enjoyment of those two fine things in life.

An Olympic Close: Wanna Whole Lotta Leona?

J.D. Mo — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 17:39:00 GMT

Hell hath not frozen over ... yet, but some believe that this phenomenon may indeed become something more than a hackneyed cliche Sunday during closing ceremonies of the Beijing Olympics. No, no not a Spanish upset of the Redeem Team. No, this is an even more unexpected event, the sort of thing previously believed to be unthinkable ... unholy even. And apparently it will be aired at an as-yet-unspecified time Sunday evening on your local NBC Olympic channel.

Guitarist Jimmy Page, the mercurial genius who gave the world Led Zeppelin, will write the coda to the Beijing games and lead British "X-Factor" pop icon Leona Lewis in a performance of Led Zep's "Whole Lotta Love." For those of us who don't know, including me, X-Factor is the British version of American Idol. In fact it's the next generation of the show "Pop Idol" which spawned American Idol. This is the Brit TV crap produced by the same Simon guy whom we see on our TV sets crabbing at cheezy singers and picking fights with Paula Abdul.

One might wonder whether Page's groundbreaking sonic slab of pseudo-sexual mojo is an appropriate piece of music to cap an Olympics ("Kashmir" would have been a better choice, but then Pagey'd probably require Robert Plant for that). One might also wonder how this union ever came to be. Turns out it has everything to do with the British hosting the 2012 games in London. The Brits are allotted some performance time during the closing ceremonies to accept the Olympic flag from the Chinese and carry on.

The all-too-obvious emissaries for this important British Empire task? Well, of course, soccer posterboy David Beckham, the guitarist from Led Zeppelin and the 2006 winner of a pop idol TV show -- who, although she may be one of the sensual things ever born on British soil, sings the sort of souless pop nothings that turn Zep fans to stone. She cites Mariah Carey as an influence. Of course.

As these things go, once Page agreed to allow the use of the song, his involvement grew to encompass composition of the British musical score and a starring role in final production:

I prefer to look on the bright side and remember that Pagey's recent collaborations have been brilliantly executed. The Black Crowes tour (1999-2000) was the next best thing to Led Zeppelin; the encore guest appearance with the Foo Fighters earlier this summer rocked; the Led Zeppelin reunion in December has been hailed as the concert of the decade. Brilliant, all of it.

And who can forget "Come with Me" - the *** son of "Kashmir" meets Sean "Puffy" Combs and a Godzilla flick? The very mention of it caused bloodletting in the Houses of Holy, but the result was astonishingly ... good -- with Page even writing for "Kashmir" a fresh new bridge. It was so good, the youtube police have zagged the incendiary, full orchestra 1998 Saturday Night Live performance ... but leave it to the anime kids to give us something cool to look at here:

As for Leona, she of "Bleeding Heart" or whatever the hit was called, I think we can all agree that "Whole Lotta Love" is a stretch for a girl who wears hoopish gowny things in concert and says she's not brave enough to pose nude, even for PETA. Leona may be exotically beautiful in an Aphrodite rising from the foam sort of way, but this is not a gig where she can get by on sultry looks alone. For this collaboration to work she'll have little choice on the world's largest stage but to loosen up and embrace Whole Lotta Love's grinding, gutteral surges which leave little to the imagination. Will Page and Lewis tempt the erotic depths of the song's middle section?

This could be incredibly hot or an embarassing disaster, but I'll hold out for the former. I'm sure Page knows exactly what he's doing ...

Keep-a-coolin baby ...

The youtube police have nabbed video of the final production but here's what it looked like:

They've nabbed that too, and we know who they are. You may find it on the nbc.olympics.com I'd imagine, but here's another idea: Go back up to the interview with Page and let it play through. You will then get a menu 1-7 of "related video." Pick #7 -- you won't be disappointed.

Keep a coolin' baby.

Shooting for gold: USA-Spain live 1:30am CST

J.D. Mo — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 00:10:00 GMT

PREGAME: After two weeks of early morning games, we get a Team Redeem night game, an after midnight special - and, yes, the time is correct. TMJ4 will broadcast the USA vs. Spain gold medal game at 1:30am CST.

This will be the first rematch in these Olympics for both teams, which should make things interesting. No one should expect a replay of the first game last Saturday in group play, when 2006 world champion Spain played Washington Generals to Team USA's Harlem Globetrotters, turning the ball over 28 times in a 37-point Redeem Team romp.

The Aug. 16 game was also perhaps the only Olympic game in which Team USA shot well from 3-point range, Carmelo Anthony and Tayshaun Prince combining for 7-10. The rest of the team shot 5-15, which isn't going to stop Spain from packing defenders in the paint and daring Team Redeem to prove it can hit jumpshots.

Team USA hasn't spoken well for the state of shooting in the NBA. The 3-pointer in international play is just 20' 9" out from the hole, a good 2-and-a-half feet closer than the NBA 3-pointer. The top two NBA outside shooters in these Olympics, as ranked by 82games.com, are not on the USA team. They are Spain's Jose "I made T.J. Ford expendable" Calderon of the Raptors and Mavs all-pro Dirk Nowitzki of Germany. Kobe, Carmelo, Lebron and even Michael Redd, Team Redeem's alleged shooter, are nowhere near the top in NBA shooting.

Unfortunately, that's the way the league is these days; and the Redeem Team happens to be a very good reflection of today's NBA. Kobe, Lebron, Dwyane Wade, Chris Paul, Dwight Howard and Chris Bosh -- this is their era, though one might get an argument from Boston. Eventually an international team would make Team USA pay for its poor shooting, but I'm not expecting the payday to come tonight. (ESPN's Chris Sheridan seems concerned but this Spain team isn't the one.)

Fortunately, Team Redeem also reflects the best NBA qualities -- the tough defense and mean, hungry competitive spirit that one finds on the NBA's top teams. No, there are no Celtics on this team, but if you watched the NBA Finals or the Cavs-Celtics series, you might wonder whether it's humanly possible for a Pau Gasol-led team to beat a hungry Lebron James team. And this Lebron team has Kobe Bryant on it. (Funny, the end-of-week media angle was to annoint a team leader. NBC says it's Lebron; other media tabs Kobe; the coach and ESPN's Chris Sheridan says Jason Kidd. And so it goes.)

The Team USA defense has been the story of the Olympic basketball tournament, and there's no reason to expect the D to let up in the gold medal game. I'm expecting the opposite -- one of the most astonishing and relentless defensive performances in Olympic history. Spain should be ready to play, especially after the drubbing they took in the teams' first meeting, but it shouldn't matter.

Unfortunately, the Spanish will be playing without their point guard, Calderon, who's out with a "slightly torn abductor muscle" which is somewhere in the thigh-to-groin area of the legs. (I wonder how the Australian team would have handled this injury.) Calderone's absence should mean plenty of playing time for 17-year-old Ricky Rubio, a kid who makes NBA scouts drool.

In addition to Pau Gasol (Kobe's talented-but-soft Laker teammate), brother Marc Gasol (traded to the Grizzlies for Pau last season) is a bruiser who likes to mix it up. Another guy to watch is burly big forward Felipe Reyes, Spain's leading scorer and best player in the first USA game. (Note to John Hammond - Real Madrid's Reyes has a nice shooting touch and is precisely the type of 6' 9" forward the Bucks could use, immediamente). Guard-forward Rudy Fernandez, who had 18 in the semifinals against Lithuania, is another Spanish player to watch, but Fernandez is the type of international player who's out of his league against the likes of Kobe, Lebron and D-Wade -- which is really the main problem international teams have had with Team Redeem.

So if Spain sounds slim going up against team USA, that's because it is. Juan Navarro, who played in Memphis last season, isn't playing well. Calderon is out. The front court is good, but the Argentina big men were good, too, as was Australia in the quarterfinals. Kobe and Lebron are hungry for gold. They may not shoot well enough to utterly dominate, but they do everything else so well that it shouldn't -- and doesn't -- matter.

How they got there: The semifinals featured the four teams clearly a cut above the rest of the Olympic pack but the games left a lot to be desired. After a very quiet and noncontroversial 10 tournament days, the officials made themselves big factors, and that's never good.

USA 101, Argentina 81 This game was a bit closer than the final score indicated, as Team Redeem dropped its intensity after Manu Ginobili sprained his left ankle early in the game. As Bill Walton described it in his postgame analysis: When Ginobili went down "the energy was just sucked out of the atmosphere." Down 21, the Bulls Andres Nocioni and the Rockets Luis Scola pulled Argentina within six just before half when the officials intervened to start the Carmelo Anthony free throw parade. Carmelo shot 3-14 from the floor but 13-13 from the line for 21 pts. That ain't earnin' it. Scola finished with 28 pts, 12 rebs.

Chris Sheridan, the saving grace of ESPN basketball writing, has an excellent recap in his column. Carmelo very nearly lost his cool due to Argentinian rough stuff and has been talking about what "a war" the gold medal game will be, etc. etc. Somebody get 'Melo a beer and a spliff before he starts something; let's hope Tayshaun Prince and Michael Redd get some minutes while he's coolin' his Nikes on the bench.

Michael Redd played three minutes at the end of the first half and two garbage mins at the end of the game. Redd didn't shoot or score, but grabbed three rebounds. Wouldn't it be nice if Redd hit a few threes in the gold medal game? That's all it would take to erase memories of his poor shooting through seven Olympic games. (10-31 from the floor; 5-18 on threes).

Olympics stat page for all teams.

Spain 91, Lithuania 86 Lithuania led 66-62 going into the 4th quarter but a huge Spain advantage from the foul line put Gasol and company over the top. Being ever so curious and not having watched the game, I went to the fourth quarter play-by-play to find out who got hot and won the game for Spain. Pau Gasol and Felipe Reyes (remember that name John Hammond) scored 2 quick hoops apiece to get it started, then Rudy Fernandez hit a two and three. 76-74 Spain. From there on in, the final six mins of the game, Spain didn't score a hoop and shot 17 free throws.

The fourth quarter totals - two buckets apiece for Gasol, Reyes and Fernandez, and 16-18 from the line. That's not basketball, folks. In the process, Nuggets forward Linas Kleiza of Lithuania was tossed for two unsportsmanlike fouls. Something tells me Lithuania should be playing for gold against the U.S., not the Jose Calderon-less Spanish team.