smallchou.com/blog

I was watching the Stanford 36-28 victory over Oregon State last evening when I got a text message from Un-Pseudo Stoops (we’ll often text back and forth during Cardinal sporting events):

Wow. I’m a Jim Harbaugh fan. This team actually looks tough. Not ready to say good, but I’ll give them tough.

I couldn’t have agreed more (of course, immediately after that Stanford let OSU march up and down the field on two consecutive drives to almost tie the game up, but let’s just put that aside for a moment). The other word that popped into my head as I watched us run up 200+ rushing yards on a Pac-10 team for the first time in (probably) years was ‘prepared’. However, ‘prepared’ isn’t the same type of compliment as ‘tough’. Being excited about your team being ‘prepared’ is a backhanded compliment if I’ve ever heard one. After all, to be excited about good preparation implies your team has previously been decidedly ‘unprepared’ in the past (read: 2004-2006).

‘Tough’, though, is a real compliment in sports. It implies a certain grit and iron that we love in our athletes. At its core, toughness in sports indicates an acceptance of (or even interest in?) giving and receiving physical punishment for the purpose of winning. The other indicator is a complete unwillingness to complain or whine. At the end of the day, this is why Favre’s legacy has been tarnished, not because he decided to un-retire – we can all understand still wanting to play, just not crying about being unwanted.

In many ways, ‘tough’ is the greatest compliment that can be paid to an athlete who is, on balance, less physically-talented than his competitors. That’s why I was so excited, as a 49ers season ticket holder, to read Michael Silver’s article on JT O’Sullivan’s lack of sympathy for Alex Smith and Shaun Hill.

I’ve been lukewarm on O’Sullivan, mostly because it’s been hard to get a read on what kind of a guy he is. It turns out that he’s quite the surly athlete, hardened by years of bouncing around the NFL. Even today, he’s by far the lowest-paid QB on the Niners roster, yet he’ll be the one running out as QB1 to open the season next week. A great bit from the piece:

Harkening back to his college days, O’Sullivan recalls, “I loved it when we’d play a school from a more prominent conference. You had a bunch of guys who thought, ‘I’m pretty sure I was good enough to play at this school, but they didn’t want me.’ You get a whole group like that, all of us with chips on our shoulders, and it’s pretty powerful.”

Eight employers later, does O’Sullivan still carry that chip?

“Oh,” he said, “the chips have turned to boulders … to mountains.”

At the end of the day, toughness really can’t be proven with some words in an article, it has to be shown by doing things like diving into the stands at full-speed to make an outrageous catch (Jeter). Those are the types of moments that can make even me, a guy who hates the Yankees, acknowledge the legend of Derek Jeter.

But to me it’s a good sign that O’Sullivan’s bitter and angry. It’ll make him that much hungrier to not lose his job after all these years of waiting.

Let’s go, Niners.

1 comment

Yesterday I had the tremendous pleasure of being a part of my own brother’s wedding. Needless to say, everything today (Sunday) has been incredibly dulled emotionally because of the dramatic high from their wedding. I probably could have been robbed today with zero emotional effect.

I told Michael and Mara on Friday night that at least a few small things were bound to go awry on Saturday, so not to worry about it. Miraculously though, it really feels like the whole ceremony/reception ran like clockwork. I’m clearly a biased party, but it was an amazing event. You can read about the long preparation the happy couple had at michaelandmara.com .

I also had the honor of giving a short toast/speech as the Best Man. Through the amazing power of the Interweb, you can see it here on Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4cZhR9rV3a4

And certainly over the coming days there’ll be a ton of photos getting posted up, but here are a couple choice selections from Angry Ninja’s album “Mike Chou Wedding”:

2 comments

After months (years?) of talking about it, I ate at Range last Friday. I had tried to book reservations there at least four or five times previously on Open Table, but was denied repeatedly. So, of course, Ivy and I were able to walk in on Friday evening and immediately find two seats at the bar. Who knew!

The verdict? Fantastic.

The only dish that wasn’t superb (to me) was Ivy’s cod. The two appetizers we ordered were particularly great: mushroom-filled ravioli in a lemon-cream sauce and the perfectly-seared scallops. The lamb sirloin killed and our Hamacher Pinot Noir was a great pairing.

In an area with a lot of really great restaurants, I’d say Range was immediately in my top ten, and maybe better, without any outrageous shock when the check hit the table.

No comments

Over the years, I’ve watched a lot of basketball, but I can definitively say this is a true first for me: waking up before 6am to catch a bball game on TV. It’s halftime of the US vs. Australia game at the Olympics and the US just hit a halfcourt shot to go up 12 right before the half. If you’re the Australians, don’t you have to wonder about those basketball gods?

I mean, shoot, they have Lebron, Kobe, AND you give them crazy hits like that?!

Really though, so far the Australians have effectively followed the playbook for how you stay with the Americans:

• Neutralize ball pressure by attacking the basket with the dribble (sort of a staple of any offensive gameplan against Coach K teams).
• Don’t turn the ball over (I think they have 7 or 8 turnovers at half, which against Kobe & co. qualifies as low turnover basketball).
• Try to make all the US shots difficult (or make the US shoot free throws). Hope the Americans get one of those free throw bugs, which seems to be working (I believe the US is 10-20 from the line in the first half.
• Slow the game down as much as possible by getting everyone back on defense and sagging off the US shooters (and hope they don’t shoot like they did against Spain, working so far).
• Bring in a thug to hack at the US star players to try to get someone thrown out. Dwight Howard almost fell for it when Carmelo was over-aggressively fouled.
• Pray and get lucky.

Despite all that, they’re still down 12 at half (though they were within 6 or 7 for most of it).

Here comes the second half!

1 comment

No better way to spend a lazy Saturday morning than coming back from playing some basketball and firing up nbcolympics.com to watch the US beat up on Spain 119-82.

Random thoughts I jotted down while watching:

• I still don’t understand the officiating. Lots of very bizarre calls. Lebron chested up a guy the entire way down court on defense, held him as he tried to cut, and they called the foul on the offense. At least it goes both ways, sort of.
• Jason Kidd obviously is starting these games as a lifetime achievement award. Chris Paul does a lot better pushing pace and pressuring on defense.
• In general, the ball pressure by the US is the best part of their game. Lots of forced turnovers, lots of traps off of ball screens. I think the official number ended up being 28 turnovers – that’s ridiculous.
• Spain’s superstar youngster, Ricky Rubio, hasn’t looked that impressive, though he is 17. Scouts think he could go number one overall when he gets old enough. So far all I’ve seen him do is get flustered by Chris Paul and Deron Williams pressuring him and get bailed out by two shitty foul calls by the refs. He does appear to be pretty skilled, but he certainly doesn’t look like an elite athlete in ANY way. Not sure how that’s going to translate to the NBA, where it’s just really hard to dominate as a point guard without top-shelf athleticism in some way. His shot is also way too slow. It’s a pure set shot and he winds up for literally a second on catch.
• By the way, Rubio’s jersey says “Ricky” on the back. No last name, just “Ricky”.
• Pau’s brother Marc Gasol looks and plays like a fatter, longer-haired version of Brad Miller
• Dwyane Wade looks GREAT. Definitely doesn’t look like he has any lingering injury effects. He’s doing a tremendous job in help defense and is getting his hands on a lot of balls. He just had one dunk that actually made me exclaim “Whoa!” Yes, I’m also sitting by myself in my room.
• Lebron can jump very high. He’s also ripped. When you see him playing against guys who aren’t as physically gifted as all the usual NBA superstars, you’re just reminded that he was clearly genetically-engineered to be a basketball playing machine.
• The Spanish use the dirty rec center play of slowing the game down by haphazardly chucking the ball away every time they make a bucket. They also flop a lot, though not quite as much as the Greeks. I guess this is just standard International basketball and it really explains a lot about how Manu Ginobili plays in the NBA.
• Hey, there’s been a Tayshaun Prince sighting! Hooray!
• Spain has switched to a zone. It’ll be interesting to see how the US team, full of a ton of guys who like having the ball in their hands, are able to attack it with the pass. Or Lebron can just hit a 24′ three-pointer, like he just did.
• In general, the US is doing a good job defending the high pick-and-roll at the top of the key, in which Spain usually seems to want to hit one of the Gasol brothers rolling straight down the lane. Lots of helping and recovering from the other defenders, leading to other Spanish players getting the ball in awkward places. Seems like they should be sticking some shooters in the corners to counteract, but haven’t seen it yet.
• It’s amazing how easy it is to beat a full-court press when you have Chris Paul and Deron Williams on the floor at the same time. I’m not sure what Spain’s accomplishing by pressing, unless they just want to speed up the game.
• An AWFUL traveling call that a ref just made on Kobe. So bad that Coach K went to the head shake and “get that shit out of here” wave.
• Dwight Howard is on a mission to block every shot that he sees. He just picked up his third goaltending call, on an outrageous volleyball swat into the stands.

Time for the medal round. From the looks of it, our guys just need to avoid injury, foul trouble, and choking. Yikes, I think I just jinxed them.

1 comment

I hope I’m not ruining your day if you were planning on watching the highlights in primetime tonight, but the US Mens Basketball team beat Greece this morning 92-69 .

I watched a bit of it this morning on nbcolympics.com (note, you can stream the entire game online and the quality is fantastic). A few random thoughts:

• If the US loses, it’ll probably be because of foul trouble. If you’re used to watching US college or NBA basketball, it’ll feel like these International FIBA games are a complete joke from an officiating perspective. You know when you’re playing pick-up with some random dudes and that ONE GUY calls a foul on EVERYTHING? That must be how all the US players feel, especially the guards. Lots of tiny ticky-tack calls. Luckily for the US, all of the other countries are much more used to this style of officiating.
• As expected, Kobe is the ringleader. He sets the tone on defense by playing really hard and it just permeates the rest of the team. Everyone pressures hard on the ball and denies passes – sort of classic Coach K defensive philosophy.
• The size of Lebron and Carmelo really helps the US on defense. With four guys on the floor who can pick up against guards, we’re really able to switch a ton of ball and off-ball screens. Trapping off of pick-and-rolls also works great when you have those two extra perimeter defenders to deny the next pass on a trap.
• Lebron can jump very high.
• The tandem of Howard and Bosh at the 5 spot is probably the weak link, only in that we’ve only got those 10 fouls to work with (please, God, don’t force us to put Boozer in). With all the stupid shit the FIBA refs call, could be an issue.
• Chris Paul and Deron Williams both look a little uncomfortable deferring to the other scorers so much. When they’re able to spend some time breaking their guys down off the dribble, they look great. Also, when Paul is out on the break, he’s a complete blur. The transition game in general is a huge advantage for the US.
• The Greek team LOVES to flop. At one point Kobe fouled one guy and he fell down like he’d been shot with a Magnum. Right on queue, the FIBA ref called a flagrant foul (you can’t make this stuff up).

Gotta love the Olympics.

No comments

Unless you’ve been living in a hole for a few weeks (or you’re just not a football fan, which is probably the less likely of these two possibilities), you’ve heard quite a bit about the Brett Favre and Green Bay Packers saga which finally ended today with Favre being introduced as the new QB for the New York Jets.

The Hashmarks blog on ESPN has a pretty good write-up about how it all went down. At the end of the day though, know this: The Green Bay Packers ended up with a helluva deal out of an extremely difficult situation.

Last week a friend asked me what I thought the Packers should do and I honestly had no idea. They were basically in a rarely-seen lose-lose-lose situation. They could tell Favre to shut up and go away (PR disaster). They could tell Favre to come back (and look like desperate blowhards willing to bend at the waist for him). Or they could move Favre to another team (with the Vikings the most serious suitors at that point, that would have been truly disastrous).

Instead, here’s what they ended up with:

• They moved Favre to an AFC team (meaning they probably will never have to stare at him on the other sideline)
• They got (most likely) a 2nd or 3rd round pick
• The situation ended with Favre actually looking like kind of the bad guy
• They received closure of the most clear kind

And lest you think they didn’t get enough, let me remind you that in the NFL draft picks are king. If you can get a 2nd or 3rd round pick for an aging QB who missed most of your training camp and who was prone to suddenly throwing absurd interceptions at the most inopportune times, you probably do it. Hell, if Brett had never retired and you got an offer for a 2nd round pick? You at least listen, right?

So if I’m Packers front-office management tonight? I’m high-fiving my buddies and going out on a celebration binge. It sounds awful, but they basically pulled an 8 out of a situation where any person in his right mind would have been happy with a 3.

No comments