Duke nixes non-conference games after losing two games

 Duke is 2-2 this season and has wins over Coppin State and Bellarmine, but has lost to Michigan State and Illinois. Following the loss to Illinois on Tuesday, Coach K questioned playing during the COVID-19 pandemic.

On Thursday, Alabama coach Nate Oats said he felt Krzyzewski’s comments were made because Duke has lost two games.

Later on Thursday, Duke announced it would not be playing any more non-conference games this season. Coach K explained why in a video posted on social media.

Duke had games against Gardner-Webb and Charleston Southern that will not be played.

Duke suffered its largest home non-conference loss with the 15-point defeat to Illinois. Coach K just wasn’t having that.

 

Sarcasm: Baseball Is Going To Happen This Year

I'm not a big soccer fan so what they did to get on the field with no one in the stands is amazing considering the American sports leagues cannot figure out a way to get out of their own way. I think realistically there wont be sports this year. Mark 2020 as one of the worst years of many of our lifetimes and sports is at the bottom of all things considered but we do want to see sports as it has always been a way to bring us out of whatever doldrums we have had over time. Right now sports are helping to add to the doldrums. You've got a Nascar driver willing to quit over a battle flag used by the confederacy in the civil war and as was told to me once it is actually not the true confederate flag. But who cares it is about what it represents. Believe it or not there are a lot of people of color who like Nascar. I am one of them. But I hardly watch races because of said flag. Then you have the documentary of the last dance of the Chicago Bulls and you go from thinking right out that Michael Jordan was the G.O.A.T in NBA basketball to the biggest ass towards his teammates. Sports find the ugliest ways to fill dead air.

As professional sport tries to get back on its feet the truth is it might have to do a reset to next year. The oldest battle in sports, ownership versus players. Of course the fans have no say in any of this because there won't be any when the games do get going. But who wants to follow a team for 40 plus games and possible playoffs which makes a season pass like a fart and a stink that lingers which could be a player strike. Football will look like the XFL once again with no one in the stands and clumsy efforts to social distance and suffocate with a heavy helmet and pads on and face masks. And that's just the NFL. College football with the same issues but the student athlete part of it definitely not part of it because no one will be on the campuses and where will they play when some of their towns were overwhelmed with COVID.

We are in a time that is like a dog chasing its tail because no one knows for sure what to do. But rather than putting aside issues and just playing it's probably even harder now as many college players will not participate because of racism on their campuses.

Sports needs to do an even deeper dive on the racism on the campuses. Also the fact not many HBCU's are on the schedule of largely white schools. We could spend hours naming the Hall of Famers that have come out of those schools. Now that we see baseball complaining about the number of games. The NBA not knowing how they're going to come back and football thinking it's going to have things as usual the country is burning over things people feel they have no control over and is having a reckoning with its past and future. Not many people seem to care whether or not baseball is going to happen this year.   

The Bears have a problem of being in the right place at the wrong time. It is obvious that the Mitchell plan didn't work and the fellow who traded up to draft him when he could have fell to him at whatever the draft position an with much better quarterbacks were left to be drafted; So they go out and trade mind you, trade for Nick Foles when Cam Newton's name has been bandied about and he still doesn't have a team to play for when the season starts. Get this he is now saying that he would take a back up role. Now this is quite a bit of time after the Foles trade but Newtons name has been in the media tied to one team or another. Did the Bears do due diligence to find out what it would take to acquire Newton? They need a QB like Newton. A more wise and versatile player than Trubiski. When the team that drafted you doesn't want you especially with no body of proof from his college days and Deshaun Watson who had just won a College National Title was still sitting there. No wonder I don't miss sports like I used to. Cam would have taken over the starting spot after a couple of games and Trubiski would have been a memory and soon out of the league unless he would take a pay cut to be a back up and then  what goes around comes around when he's the back up. He's gotta be better than Brian Hoyer who is looking like the New England Patriots starting quarterback. He was a starter in Chicago for a short time and it was a joke. But I wouldn't want to be on the team that drafted me and then shitted on me and brought in an old broken down qb simply because he knows the system. The Bears would never admit they fell asleep at the wheel on Cam and even the Green Bay Packers had the balls to draft Aaron Rodgers back up because they knew it was something they needed. Rodgers wasn't happy but so what. It is for the good of the team. When football starts up again it will be the same with the Bears and Packers. Speaking of the draft the Bears drafted like they're on the precipice of winning the Super Bowl. Outside of Trubisky they've drafted the same position. Role players not expected to make any sort of mark. And I don't think they've solved the kicker situation yet.

What is your team doing at this time as they figure out where and when they’ll play. If it’s baseball perhaps they could play on the minor league fields since the minor league season has been cancelled. Even though the accommodations are small at least it will limit how many people come to the games.

We have to get used to it people. Things are going to strange for a while. Consequence be damned the country is opening up and if you think things are crazy now chaos will reign with all the stops and starts no matter the industry. Different states different plans. Different sports. Different plans. The fact is the “what if moment” turned real and the story of it won’t be written during our lifetimes. Cancellations of sports as a whole whether it’s tennis, golf or baseball could possibly be the straw that breaks the economy for good. Unless your team however is the dregs how would it feel to watch without people in the stands or even play that way? No shirtless bums at Soldier Field when the Packers come to Chicago. But who is to say that game would be played in Chicago? Let’s be thankful we finally got to see a Super Bowl without Tom Brady before it all went sideways. I say that tongue in cheek. Seriously every little step to get back to sports is a step towards normalcy. Every step helps.

Let This Be The End Of The Last Dance

A sports starved populous latch like pit bulls to every story of the “Last Dance,” of the Michael Jordan led Chicago bulls and his relationships with his teammates. His ability to embarrass his opponents. I’d said for years what made that era of the Chicago Bulls stand out was the number of Hall Of Famers who didn’t win Championships because the road to the top went through Chicago. What doesn’t get mentioned were the seasons before; What we call the Doug Collins years. Once the Bulls started seeing success and getting close to the NBA Finals and the difficult battles with the Detroit Pistons including when the shamelessly stalked off the court without shaking Bulls players’ hands. These were also years where the City of Chicago was filled with crime and corruption. During the Bulls rise was also the rise of the Chicago Bears. Imagine two dominant teams in one city. Certainly Chicago was the center of the sports universe in those two sports. The White Sox had their share of characters and let’s not forget the ’84 Cubs. The road for the Bulls was not an easy one but it was a compelling one that the argument over who is the best is being argued not in Chicago but everywhere else. Believe me more people watched the, “Last Dance,” outside of Chicago than in Chicago simply because the Bulls were a force.

I can see an organization wanting to win but allowing a player to put his hands on another player as alleged that Jordan was not afraid to do is a step too far. With social media Jordan wouldn’t have gotten away with it and he shouldn’t have. Nowadays players would be fined if not suspended. And the crowd around his locker wouldn’t be because of the number of points he scored that night. However in this time of yellow journalism there would have to be someone crazy enough to face Michael and challenge him the way he challenges his teammates. Of course they would have to face his vengeance because in the end Jordan always gets his man. Possibly his notoriety would have caught up to his fame but the fact would still remain that Jordan is the greatest. Lebron will be the greatest of his generation but a couple of things I’ve seen that would never have happened to Jordan: he never lost a championship round and no other team has ever gotten into his head even when the Pistons wrote the Jordan rules. Honestly I’m tired of hearing about the whole thing as much as I am of hearing about the ’85 Bears. Chicago if not sports as a whole is about what you’ve done for me lately which is why we’ll soon get tired of hearing about the 2016 Cubs as it is looking like another 100 hundred years for them. I don’t need to watch old video of Jordan and I can remember where I was when they won every championship and the battles they had to face to win each one. I’m as sports starved as the next but I was already of a mind sometimes you don’t want to meet your hero’s.

In this time of Covid and the desire to get things back to normal unfortunately I think sports should take a year off. I think these ideas of putting athletes back on the field whichever level high school, college and the pros is terribly premature. Athletes being told to stay home probably have no had the proper amount of preparation, and we know that no matter how much you prepare nothing can make up for actual combat. None of the MLB plans make any sense. In order for football to go on starting with college and high school campuses have to open. Not to mention where these schools are located. Were there any deaths or infections from covid in that town so it's likely that there will have to be some neutral site games. Athletes will have to be constantly quarantined and tested. At the same time if there is no sports there will be a glut of athletes coming through the pipelines where professional teams will have to go back to video of the player in order to figure out who to draft. As well as eligibility. Does it end for those who were seniors at the time of the end of their season. And what about the players behind them who are not seniors. I think it's a good time to loosen transfer rules so that when/if sports, particular college sports get going again student athletes can play where they want.

Another idea is to allow basketball players to go right into the G-League and earn a paycheck because we all know the idea of Student athletes is misleading. More athlete than student. Instead of the silly one and done let them go right into the sports in the United States and not in some war zone in a foreign country or China. Baseball players right out of high school can go into the minors so why not let basketball players do the same. Some sports will be played this season but it will look much like the XFL than or some second rate league.Most importantly we need vaccines and testing to go back to full on sports. I can hardly breathe in masks can you imagine an athlete having to wear one of those things for hours and have constant cleaning going on while the game is being played? I hope sports comes back mostly for the concession workers and security and vendors. Beyond that I'm not missing sports right now.