My Better is Better Than Your Better

Not only is this the tagline to the awesome series of Nike commercials that are currently running, but "My Better is Better Than Your Better" should also be the tagline to this year's Final Four. All year long these four juggernaut teams have been showing the country why their better is better than everyone else’s better. North Carolina, Memphis, UCLA and Kansas all won their conference regular season and their conference tournaments. They are a combined 143-8. These four teams are so loaded it’s not even funny. The number NBA players on these four rosters is staggering: Derrick Rose, Joey Dorsey, Chris Douglas Roberts, Kevin Love, Darren Collison, Russell Westbrook, Josh Shipp, Ty Lawson, Tyler Hansbrough, Wayne Ellington, Danny Green, Brandon Rush, Mario Chalmers, Darrell Arthur, Darnell Jackson…the list is absolutely ridiculous. This doesn’t even include bigs like Dean Thompson, Alex Stepheson, Sasha Kaun and Robert Dozier who could end up being serviceable post men in the Association some day. I wrote in an earlier post that this was a top-heavy tournament, but good God, I never expected it to be this lopsided. These Final Four teams hammer their opponents into submission and then keep going.

Your agility owes my agility 20 bucks

Agility is just part of what Memphis used to completely dominate a pathetic looking Texas team, who were the Oceanliner’s pick to cut down the nets. How’s that working out for me? The Memphis team is comprised of absolute freaks of nature, but they are also ridiculously good at basketball. Simply put, Derrick Rose and Chris Douglas Roberts manhandled the undersized DJ Augustin and AJ Abrams of the Longhorns. It was a joke. Rose and D-R were so much bigger, so much stronger and yet still just as quick as the helpless Texas backcourt. It was men playing against toddlers on the perimeter. Then you look inside and it was just as mismatched. Joey Dorsey vs. Connor Atchley? Please. Dorsey is one of the most jacked players in the country and threw Atchley around like a rag doll. Seriously, when Dorsey took his shirt off after the game his back and shoulder muscles were bulging out of his body. He looked like a freak defensive end and not a power forward. That dude is scary as hell. He is definitely part of the Adrian Joseph and Latrell Spreewell mold that makes you think, “Man, it really wouldn’t surprise me if this guy stabbed someone before the game.”

My quick smells like French toast

Quick is Ty Lawson exploding up and down the floor for Carolina. With Lawson at the point the Tar Heels are the fastest team in the country and run circles around the competition, if you can call it that. The rest of the team isn’t exactly a bunch of slouches either. We all know about Hansbrough, Ellington and Green, but its not like Thompson, Stepheson, Marcus Ginyard and Will Graves suck either. They would be dominant starters at most other schools. No, it’s just Quentin “Human Turnover Machine” Thomas that sucks. Seriously, he’s really bad.

There is one thing that should make Carolina fans worry however, and that is one of their own openly flaunting the basketball gods. I received a text from the Wealth Manager during the Washington State game that read:

Nobody can hang with the heels...i love it

Gutie was walking the fine line between confidence and cockiness, so I decided to be of help and replied

The bball gods dont like arrogance, id be careful

Apparently Gutie isn’t one to believe in karma, as he replied with a slap in the face of Zeus himself:

I defy the bball gods...mark my words

Such pompousness, such gall! Such flaunting of the established code of basketball ethics and fanhood! If the Tar Heels lose, we will obviously know why. Gutie’s brash and callous text angered those deities high on basketball’s Mount Olympus, and they responded accordingly.

My speed is already watching the next commercial

Speed and strength on defense is why Kansas held off a tough Davidson team. The Jayhawk defense on Stephen Curry in limiting him to 9-25 shooting was the difference. This was especially evident on the last possession, where the Kansas guards refused to let Curry get even a sliver of a glimpse at the basket, forcing him to give up the last shot to Jason Richards, who bricked horrendously from 25 feet.

This stellar perimeter defense will be imperative for Kansas against Lawson and North Carolina. But the match up I’m most looking forward to from the Carolina-Kansas game is one that may not even happen but I’m praying it does: Brandon Rush vs. Danny Green. Both these guys are so polished, so smooth, so quick, so athletic and so good that it would be a treat to see them go at it for hopefully much of the game. I don’t know how the two teams will match up defensively, but a Rush v Green battle would be amazing as a basketball fan.

Your speed moves like a gravy boat

I don’t have anything on the UCLA-Xavier game, mostly because I didn’t watch it. But I did want to add this extra line from the Nike commercial, because it is great.

All in all, let’s hope this Final Four lives up to the hype, because the games really haven’t been that great. But maybe everything was just building to three of the most mind bogglingly good games we’ve ever seen. I for one, can’t wait.

Well, that’s it for this week folks. If you are not planning to watch the Final Four this weekend, well you can either change plans to do so or stop reading this brog. Hope everyone out there is doing well. Until next time, stay safe, keep it real and go Nats.