Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Bayless should play the two

If you were around Arizona basketball last year, you may remember the is Arizona basketball elite question? I didn't ask it and didn't necessarily agree at the time, but with the way this season has started, there is at least some legitimacy to the question. I bring this up because I was searching for a box score for today's Arizona game, and I couldn't find one. There was no gamecast, no play by play. Nothing on espn.com or cbssportsline. Elite programs get updated boxscores or at least a boxscore shortly at the end of the game.

Now I still think Arizona is an elite program. Witness the No. 2 ranked recruiting class next year with the help of the No. 1 recruit Brandon Jennings. Witness their blowout of Cal State Fullerton today. Witness their impressive performance at Kansas, despite a lack of execution down the stretch.
Arizona is an elite program, but for the third straight year, this is not an elite team.

My other talking point regarding Arizona is the confusion at the point guard position. The Wildcats started with Jerryd Bayless playing the point and realized in the first five minutes of the Kansas game when they fell behind by double digits that Bayless is better served playing the two. Of course the problem is Arizona has no one to play the one, even though Nic Wise had the game of his life against Kansas.

Still, the Wildcats are better suited throwing Wise into the pg slot and letting Bayless do what he does best. And that's score. Admit the mistake, Kevin O'Neill and Lute Olson, and play Bayless at the two. Let him be the No. 2 option behind Chase Budinger because the toll it takes to handle the ball, distribute, and score is too much.
Yesterday against Cal State Fullerton, Bayless played both guard positions and Laval Lucas Perry saw some time at the one. Maybe, the coaching staff is catching on. Let's hope they find more and more time for Bayless at the two.

There is an elephant in the room
I hate to talk about the Sean Taylor for two reasons. 1. What happened was a tragedy. 2. I don't know the facts.
However, I strongly doubt that this was a random burglary as the police are currently reporting. Sean Taylor's murder not random. Antrel Rolle, one of his best friends, certainly doesn't think so.
The intruder or intruders didn't take anything. How many burglaries involve nothing being stolen?

"This was not the first incident," Rolle said. "They've been targeting him for three years now."

Rolle said many former "friends" had it in for Taylor, who was trying to build a more stable life.

When his best friend, who has known him since they were six years old, comes out and says something like that, you have to question how this possibly could have been a random attack. Put that together with the fact that there was a break-in at his house eight days earlier and someone left a knife on his bed, you don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to figure out there is something shady going on.

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