When Will It End??

This is getting ridiculous. Early in the year, maybe 10-15 games in, I noticed Baron Davis had yet to shoot over 50% in even one game for his new team. I just thought it was a weird statistical oddity that would soon vanish. After all, how hard is it to have 1 night during the entire NBA season when you make more shots than you miss? Apparently, it is impossible. Taking into account the final 19 games for Baron last year, and the 30 he has played in this season, he has now failed to eclipse the 50% mark 49 games in a row. This streak is reaching unthinkable heights.

As everybody knows, NBA players have their share of ups and downs throughout the year. Maybe there's a week where your wife or girlfriend makes you an amazing home-cooked meal every night before the game and you catch fire for 4-5 games straight. There could also be a stretch where life is just no good...kids acting up, get a flat tire on the way to the arena...maybe you can't throw the ball into an ocean for a week. But nobody should ever be able to step out on the court 49 straight times and do what Baron Davis has done. Check out LeBron James the other night against Miami: 12 of 19 shooting...that's over 50%. The guy who has taken many of Baron's minutes for the Warriors this season, C.J. Watson, put up a 5 of 7 night in LA recently...again, over 50%. How long can our man B-Dizzle possibly keep this disturbing streak going?

The other night, I expressed my fear that the streak might seriously be coming to an end. After all, Baron and the Clips were playing Sacramento, owners of the 2nd worst defensive FG % in the entire league. What better opportunity for Davis to pop this bubble than to go up against the slower Beno Udrih, an ancient Bobby Jackson, and a team without its only legitimate shot-blocking threat in Spencer Hawes? If there was ever a night for BD to put it all together and finally break out of this never ending shooting slump, this was it. Think again. 48 minutes of basketball later, our hero had mangled the box score with a ghastly 3-17 night from the floor.

To put all the cards on the table, I am well aware that Baron is playing with a pretty nasty cast of characters in LA. Consider some of his running mates right now. Freddie Jones was not even in the league until a couple weeks ago, and at this point should probably only be making appearances on All-Star Saturday night in the dunking festivities. Paul Davis recently played close to 40 minutes in a game...it's hard to even make a joke about that. Brian Skinner, Mardy Collins, and Jason Hart also complement Davis on the court. However, let us not forget that 19 of these 49 games took place for last year's Warriors, who had a multitude of options on offense. And even this year, there have been stretches where Baron has been playing alongside Zach Randolph, Al Thornton, and Marcus Camby. All quality NBA players, with whom a supposed "superstar" NBA point guard should be able to flourish. Baron...we're not asking for a season full of outstanding nights and a number of unforgettable shooting performances. We are just asking for ONE night where you go out and hit more shots than you brick. Just one night. Tonight, the Clippers visit the aging Phoenix Suns with noted sieve Steve Nash at the point and defensive stopper Raja Bell now playing in Charlotte. Will any of this matter to Baron? Probably not.


It is only a matter of time before this wildly entertaining streak is the lead story on SportsCenter. Until then, this is the place to follow all of the clanks, shanks, and missed banks. Drop a comment here or throw a comment my way at highsockslegend@gmail.com

Anybody Want the Job?

It's a funny little tradition in the sports world. Whenever a coaching vacancy opens up, a list of "possible candidates" hits the streets almost immediately. The newspaper and radio guys peruse the rest of the league and figure out which coordinators led their units to strong years. The media also likes to look back and try to figure out what position coaches in the NFL might have once played with the GM of the team in question. This person automatically becomes a "candidate." There is also usually 2-3 coaching retreads looking to make their next pit stop. Or sometimes they make you a candidate simply because your last name says that you should be one. Translation: we don't care if you are Marty, Kurt, Brian, or Tito. If your last name is Schottenheimer, you are getting interviewed. Over the next couple of weeks, we will take a deeper look at some of the leading candidates for the prestigious position of Detroit Lions head coach. First up...

Steve Spagnuolo, New York Giants (Defensive Coordinator)

The defensive coordinator from the defending Super Bowl champion Giants and current top seed in the NFC. Hard to argue too much with this guy. Spagnuolo, or "Spags" if you want to act like you know more about him than the average fan, is possibly the hottest name besides Cowher this offseason. His Super Bowl winning defense held the 18 and 0 Patriots to a pedestrian 14 points in the big game. This year, he withstood serious injuries to key players to again form one of the league's best defensive units. I like this guy's pedigree. He spent eight years under Jim Johnson in Philly, learning his current 4-3 system emphasizing a number of blitzes from everywhere on the field. Spagnuolo's aggressive mentality would be a highly refreshing change from the "We're rushing only the front four on every down...either they get pressure or we get burned."

Only a couple of things scare me about Spags. First of all, he is a dead ringer for former NBA center Jim McIlvaine. You do not want to be mentioned in the same sentence as Jim McIlvaine at any point in your life. If you recall, McIlvaine is most remembered in NBA circles for the abominable contract he received from the Western Conference champion Sonics after a year in which he averaged 2 or 3 points a game, but was unfathomably seen as a player "about to break out." Yeah, just like Gabe Kapler and Juan Encarnacion were supposed to break out as a 3-4 power hitting force in the Tigers outfield. After McIlvaine inked the 7 year deal worth over $30 million, Shawn Kemp became so upset that he was being out-earned by Big Mac that he began eating his way through the city of Seattle. McIlvaine never came close to putting up numbers to justify the contract. He turned out to be a guy who merely showed some potential in a couple of years as a supporting player, but was not nearly ready to be in the spotlight. Essentially, he was just a poor man's Dave Corzine with a lot more publicity and less facial hair. Would Spagnuolo suffer the same fate as his exact clone and go down in flames after signing the big contract? Lions fans sure hope not.

One other bad omen regarding the Giants D-Coordinator. If he does get a head coaching job this winter, he would become the 3rd defensive coordinator this decade to use a Super Bowl victory as the springboard to an NFL head coaching job. The other two: Marvin Lewis and Romeo Crennel. Much like McIlvaine, this is not exactly elite company. Lewis has done nothing in Cincy. He had a once in a lifetime group on D in Baltimore, with Hall-of-Famers like Ray Lewis and Rod Woodson. He parlayed that into a head coaching gig. Crennel worked under Bill Belichick to win his title, and jumped from there to be the boss in Cleveland. That experiment was about as successful as the dual weight loss challenge that Crennel and Charlie Weis used to run up there in New England. First guy to get under four bills would get $10,000. The money was never collected.

Bottom line: simply getting a defensive coordinator from a former Super Bowl champion is not a fail safe. But in this case, I tend to believe in the guy. If there is anything this franchise needs, it is an identity on the defensive side of the ball. Spagnuolo would bring that here. The talent would still need to be accumulated, but at least a real defensive mindset would finally be firmly in place. Steve Spagnuolo, Lions Head Coach. Seems like a good fit. I can picture it now. He leads the Lions to a shocking victory in Week 1 next season. The entire city becomes enamored with their newest coaching savior. And, of course, a 99% chance that the headline in the Free Press on that Monday morning will read, "From Spags to Riches!" Book it.


How do you feel about Jim McIlvaine Spagnuolo? Drop a comment here, or shoot me your thoughts at highsockslegend@gmail.com

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Three classic streaks...all going on at the same time! Let's hit it.

Imperfection at Last!

Chances are, if you are a professional sports team in the city of Detroit and you have a player listed in the box score as "D. Bing," and it is anyone but the legendary Dave Bing of Pistons fame...you are in serious trouble. Well, on Sunday, the much less legendary "Darnell" Bing recorded his only tackle of the season for the Detroit Lions. Needless to say, they tallied their 16th loss of the season, becoming the first NFL squad in history to achieve the ignominious feat. It took a collective effort this year to accomplish such a horrendous task.

First, much credit has to go to Rod Marinelli and his "We will stay the course" approach. Other coaches might have tried changing things around after so many consecutive losses. Not you, Rod. With brilliant son-in-law Joe Barry by your side, you guys managed to set defensive football back centuries with your "Bend, but don't break...well, we're not gonna break right away, but probably sometime in the very near future" approach. Aaron Rodgers might have thrown an INT in 6 straight games heading into the finale against the Lions, but no such issues yesterday. This is a franchise that once branded 8th round pick Willie Clay with the moniker "Big Play Willie." In other words, DB's for the Lions making big plays are few and extremely far between.

It's hard to name everybody who had a hand in this train wreck 2008 campaign. The receiving corps, minus Calvin Johnson, must be noted. By the end of the year, there were so many guys jumping into the fray straight from the NFL scrap heap that I fully expected to see a "Rison, #80" lining up in the slot during a big 3rd down on Sunday.

The quarterbacking was a group effort. Daunte Culpepper was signed up to see what he had left. Turns out the only thing he ever had was an unbelievable group of receivers in Minnesota for a few years that made him look a LOT better than he really was. Dan Orlovsky was able to absolutely master the game where he looks alright, doesn't really wow you, but you walk away thinking, "I guess he earned another start next week." I don't think I was ever over or underwhelmed by any one of his games. They all leave you with the same empty feeling inside. Big ups to Orlovsky as well for somehow managing to play the last three games of the season without registering a single rushing attempt. Way to keep those linebackers on their toes, DanO!

And how about that kickoff return game?? The only time I can ever remember a less intimidating threat there was when Lloyd Carr used to have Anthony Thomas run back kicks with the sole intention of him getting it back to the 20 and not fumbling it. What happened to the days of Mel Gray and Glyn Milburn, and even Eddie Drummond before he passed away sometime during the 2005 season? Now it's this bizarre sequence each year when some random homeless fellow, like Brandon Middleton, does the runbacks for a little more than half the year until Aveion Cason returns from wherever he was to handle the remaining games. This has become an annual Lions tradition, along with the Thanksgiving Day game and the "Let's go with the throwbacks this week to try and turn things around!" game. The 2008 Detroit Lions now stand alone in the NFL record books. 0 and 16. It might not be for the right reasons, but this will always be a year to remember.


#1...In Jersey Number Only

Baron Davis refuses to let his streak die. After today's dismal 4 for 13 effort at home against the Mavs, Davis has now failed to shoot over 50% in 47 straight games! 47 consecutive times he has stepped into an NBA arena...each and every time he has failed to eclipse the 50% mark. This is an astonishing streak that is as hard to believe as any stat or figure that I can remember in sports history. The last time he managed to make more than he missed in a game was way back on March 12th. That's last season. There are other interesting facts about that time period for Baron. It wasn't as if that 10-17 shooting night on March 12 was a shock, either. The opposite, actually. With the season winding down, and his contract expiring in a matter of weeks, that game ended a stretch for Davis in which he shot over 50% in 4 of 5 games. Since that fateful March 12th night, he has suited up 47 times...and failed to return to this statistical paradise even once. I guarantee if this were brought to Baron's attention, he would be absolutely shocked. After finding out about his ghastly run of ineptitude, I bet Baron would go out that night, make 2 of his first 3 shots, fake a strained hammy, find a cozy seat on the Clipper bench, and watch this "streak" go up in flames.

Many in the sports world will always believe that Joe DiMaggio's 56 game hitting streak in 1941 is the greatest streak of all-time. While I show nothing but respect to Joe D and his miraculous 56-gamer, Baron Davis' nightly bricklaying show is becoming a global phenomenon. Only problem is, Baron's Clippers head up to Sacramento this Tuesday for a showdown with the Kings. The same Kings that rank 29th out of 30 in the NBA in FG % defense. Let's hope the drama does not end here...I'm still enjoying this too much.

(Original piece on Baron's shooting woes can be found here.)


From a Guy Who Can't Make One to a Guy that Can't Miss One

Another fun NBA streak to keep your eye on as we approach the New Year. Jose Calderon, the underrated point guard for the Toronto Raptors, has connected on 69 straight free throws. The NBA record belongs to former Pistons title winner Micheal Williams. The former garbage timer for the Bad Boys once knocked down 97 in a row from the charity stripe. I always enjoy streaks and records like this because it is something we have all tried to do when we're messing around at the gym. Head to the line, see how many you can hit consecutively. For most of us, getting to 10 or 15 is a nice feat. Or, if you are like Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf, making 100 without touching any part of the rim while Ramadan is in full force is what you're shooting for.

Jose Calderon is a fun player to watch, and this little run he has going at the line is really not getting much publicity to this point. I know I will be paying attention as he gets closer to the magic number, now a mere 28 away. I'm calling out the pressure starting to get to the Spaniard right around #85, and him leavin' one off the front rim to end the run. When that happens, Micheal Williams will finally be able to sleep peacefully again, knowing his record is safe and that he will continue to be remembered for something besides the incomprehensible spelling of his first name.



What other streaks are out there? E-mail me at highsockslegend@gmail.com

Life Begins at 40

40 points. It has been brewing for a while now. Throughout the month of December, Rodney Stuckey has been scorching the nets at a ridiculous rate. The 2nd year guard has been getting to the hoop at will. His jump shot, at one time considered to be his weak link, has improved dramatically, right in front of our eyes. With his shooting percentage hovering around 60% for the month, an explosion from Stuckey was bound to happen very soon. He just needed to get the shot attempts, and the rest would take care of itself. 40 points later, it was possibly a career changing night for #3.

It was clear early in the game tonight that Rodney Stuckey was simply in no mood to mess around. No more losses to middling teams like the 76ers and Jazz. No more settling for jumpers when this team is obviously built to run and outscore the other club. In the 1st quarter, Stuckey got off to a hot start by driving for layups on 3 of 4 possessions. Timeout, Bulls...Vinnie Del Negro needed to find a solution to stopping the possessed guard from Eastern Washington. A pattern was developing. He tacked on 5 more points the rest of the quarter, culminating in a picturesque three-point play where Stuckey displayed a beautiful left hand while taking the hit from Luol Deng (or whoever that is impersonating Deng this season).

The first 6 minutes of the 2nd quarter represented the only stretch of time all night that the Bulls would not be lit up by Mr. Stuckey. After all, he was on the bench. When he returned, and for the next 3 quarters, it was more of the same. Stuckey driving to the bucket time after time, creating contact and hanging in midair for what seemed like an eternity while controlling his body and nestling the ball in off the glass. When the defender took a step off, daring Stuckey to shoot, he burned 'em.

Vinnie Del Negro is another of the 1st year head coaches that seem so common this year in the NBA. The guy might have a nice career on the sidelines, but he won't forget this night for a long time. Del Negro is the kind of coach that not only seems to live and die with each game, but with each possession. Each time Stuckey dropped in a basket Tuesday, Del Negro slumped his shoulders and turned to his assistants as if to say, "What more can we do?" Not to diminish Stuckey's night in any way, but let's just say Coach Del Negro did not exactly reinvent the wheel with his coaching innovations against the Pistons. When a player gets in a zone like Stuckey was, coaches will often send a double team to force the ball out of his hands. 'Make somebody else beat you,' the saying goes. There were maybe 2-3 times all night that Stuckey was trapped on a pick-and-roll and forced to dish. Otherwise, it was mostly one man preventing him from putting the ball in the hole. And clearly, Stuckey was blistering anybody the Bulls put in front of him.

-Derrick Rose, #1 overall pick, savior of the Bulls franchise...phhhh...I liked you better when they called you Darius Washington, Jr.
-Larry Hughes took a shot at him. After all, he did lead the NBA in steals a few years back. Tonight, the only thing he stole was a paycheck.
-Thabo Sefolosha, the lanky guard from Switzerland known for his defense, proved two things tonight. One, he has no business guarding Rodney Stuckey 1-on-1 unless they are the last 2 guys left on Earth, and even then, he's better off going zone. Two, the only things that should come from Switzerland are watches and tennis players.
-Lindsey Hunter, or as Doug Collins would describe, "The best on-ball defender in the history of this league. Just a great person. If I ever had a son, I would want him to be just like Lind...oh right, I already have a son. Well, you get the point." These things might have been true 10-12 years ago, back when Collins was still representing the boys in Teal. But tonight, Lindsey Hunter was clean shaven, 20 pounds overweight, and helpless in stopping the man he might have thought he was once going to turn out to be...Rodney Stuckey.

In Monday's column, I talked about Michael Curry and his questionable coaching in the Atlanta loss this weekend. In that game, Curry sat Stuckey for almost half of the deciding quarter after he had just torched the Hawks in the 3rd, bringing the Pistons back from a big hole. Tonight, the circumstances took care of themselves. Allen Iverson suffered a minor injury early in the 2nd half, thus removing any chance of Sunday's history repeating itself. Stuckey played the entire 2nd half, looking fresher as everybody else wore down. When the Bulls went on a 12-0 run to start the 3rd to cut the lead to one, momentum seemed to be all on the side of the visitors. Now was the time for Stuckey to unleash his entire arsenal of skills on the now-confident, soon to be stunned once again, Chicago Bulls. Bombs away from downtown, Stuckey's only 3 of the night. Loses his defender and drops in another layup on a nice feed from buddy Arron Afflalo. A minute later, he drove the paint again and scored. The 1 point game was now 11, the crowd was on its feet, and Vinnie Del Negro did the only thing he could all night to stop the unstoppable Stuckey, if only for a few minutes. He called time out.

If there is a bigger picture to this game, it is the Allen Iverson trade and what it means in terms of the development of Rodney Stuckey and the prospects of this year's Pistons. I was never one to be in favor of the trade. Like most Piston fans, I had become attached to Chauncey over the years. The first "big shot," a 3 over Chris Mills to beat Golden State, the near half-courter against New Jersey, the Finals MVP...he was everything you wanted in a Piston. But I could understand if Joe Dumars decided this team needed some kind of shakeup. This current group may have topped out, and almost seemed resigned to lose every year in the Eastern Conference Finals.

My main problem is, with Dumars knowing even better than any of us how good Rodney Stuckey can be if given the opportunity, why deal Chauncey for a guy like Iverson? A guy who has made a career out of making things happen for himself, but not for others. I don't recall him doing much for the careers of young superstars in Jerry Stackhouse and Carmelo Anthony. He is a player that needs a certain number of touches a game to stay happy. Essentially, when you are an Allen Iverson team, you win or lose with the rock in his hands. But if it's in his hands, how can it be in Stuckey's hands as well? Short answer: it can't. Tuesday night, Piston fans got a glimpse of what could be if young Stuckey were given this kind of freedom on a nightly basis. Allen Iverson is still a valued member of this team and his production is needed for them to do anything special this year. But the sooner he understands that he cannot be "The Man" anymore and that he needs to defer to Stuckey on a nightly basis, the better off everyone will be. Essentially, we have an "Old Stuckey" and a "Young Stuckey" on this club...how about we let the young fella do his thing?

When the dust settles on this season, someone might look back on this game as just 1 of 82 on a never-ending NBA schedule. But it could end up meaning a lot more. Ever since Rodney Stuckey was drafted from little known Eastern Washington in 2007, we've been told that he has all of the skills to be one of the greats. In flashes, these skills would be displayed. At some point, all of it would come together, we hoped. The athleticism, the strength, the touch, the aggressiveness, and the will to be the best player on the court at all times. On Tueday night at the Palace, everything came together for the man his teammates simply call "Stuck." Only, on this night, he was anything but.


E-mail me at highsockslegend@gmail.com

Yet Unnamed Monday Weekend Sports Re-Kap

Believe in Never

They say that you learn something new every day. Well, yesterday, I learned the lesson that if you are trying to gain credibility with a relatively new sports blog, predicting a victory for the 2008 Detroit Lions is not the path to go down. I knew things were bad on the car ride over to Ford Field with my boy BK. He is as much a die-hard Lions fan as there is in this city. He still makes noise when the Lions are on defense and is known to shout things such as, "Watch for the Play-Action!" on approximately 78% of the opposing team's plays. And he killed me for going public with the Lions victory prediction on this once-respected site. I thought our defense would be so jacked up that a couple big plays would just fall in their lap for the first time all year. Didn't exactly go down like that.

Very quickly, the game developed the feel of a pre-season contest. Sparse crowd, zero energy in the stadium...only difference was that if it were indeed an exhibition game, the Lions would have come out firing. Instead, they were fired upon...repeatedly. Drew Brees threw for 351 yards, and if he wanted to, it could have been 500+. His ample time in the pocket throughout the game reminded me of an old Detroit Vipers commercial. The Vipers' goalie was just chillin' by his net, sitting in a beach chair, watching some tube and enjoying a beverage. Even though the game was going on, there was no action coming his way, so he was the picture of cool. Same deal with Brees. When he wanted to look for the deep ball, it was there with his receivers a good 15 yards past any Lions "defensive" back. When he wanted to check it down, he found Jeremy Shockey or Billy Miller or a running back and bagged 10-20 yards that way. After seeing the time and comfort afforded him in the pocket by the gracious Lions defense, I'm convinced he could have thrown for Two-Fiddy playing lefthanded.

It was most definitely the nastiest performance of the year by a soon to be historically pathetic football team. It was the perfect storm on Sunday: zero desire, extreme lack of talent, a coaching staff trotting out the same game plan for the 15th game in a row, and a crowd so dead that the only real cheers I heard all day were those reserved for Dashing Donut. The lesson I learned is that if I feel the need to toss out some bold prediction regarding events at a Lions game, I'm better off keeping things simple and just calling out a dominating win by the Donut. After all, the Lions disappoint you week after week. But when's the last time you felt anything but ecstasy after spending some quality time with a 'glazed and sprinkled?' Live and learn.


Most People Really Enjoy Their Sundays

Arthur Spooner, the character perfected by Jerry Stiller on 'The King of Queens,' once uttered the following pearl of wisdom, "Ah, Sunday. You know what I like to call it...Fun Day." Well, I know one NBA team that would vehemently disagree with that statement. The Detroit Pistons hate Sundays. After a setback to the Atlanta Hawks yesterday, their Sunday record on the season sits at a Lions-esque 0-6. Their record every other day of the week: 14-5.

Somehow, the story after this game ended up being the "benching" of Allen Iverson in the 4th quarter by Michael Curry and the possible breach this created between the two. Apparently, Curry felt the big day by Mike Bibby was directly related to Iverson's struggles on the defensive end and sat him down for a few minutes in the 4th quarter. Just hard to understand how this can be looked at as a "benching."

It is true that Iverson was lifted from the game with 4:30 left and the Pistons only down 6. However, he had only managed one bucket in the 2nd half, and was largely ineffective for most of the game. And he was coming out for Rodney Stuckey, the Pistons' best player by far on Sunday and someone who had been curiously sitting for almost half the quarter. The move seemed 100% within the flow of the game to me, and not this controversial punishment that many are making it out to be. This is a little bit of a different team than most in the NBA, with crunch time lineups varying from night to night. With that said, though, Michael Curry has to do a better job of identifying who the best guys are heading into the crucial stretches of the 4th and making sure they are on the floor. Rodney Stuckey had 10 points in the last 5 minutes of the 3rd quarter on Sunday, singlehandedly changing the momentum of the game. In the last quarter, Coach Curry sat Stuckey for 5 minutes while managing to get him one measly shot attempt, a jumper he buried in the last minute with the game no longer in doubt.

Now this is not a bad loss, by any means. The Hawks are quietly turning into one of the East's more formidable foes, especially at Philips Arena. But it tends to sting a little more when you lose the game without really exposing your big guns at the biggest moments. Understandably, Michael Curry is a rookie head coach and is still learning the craft. However, after his late-game clock mismanagement on Friday against Utah and the aforementioned Stuckey problems yesterday, this inexperience is coming through a little too frequently. The only saving grace to all this; the Pistons have next Sunday off.


Couple Other Quick Hitters

-Very impressive win for Michigan State over #5 Texas in Houston. Not the prettiest of games, but a gritty, statement win nonetheless. The Spartans had yet to record a real quality win this season, and this victory should serve as a big confidence booster heading into Big Ten play in a couple of weeks. Excellent job by Tom Izzo and the coaching staff for devising a game plan intent on shutting down the Longhorns' high-powered guard, A.J. Abrams. Travis Walton badgered him relentlessly whenever he was in the game, and the Spartans held Abrams to just 8 points while playing the entire 40 minutes. The two best players for MSU both came off the pine. Goran Suton was in superb form on his way to 18 points, making the squad much more formidable with his presence in the lineup. Durrell Summers hit the biggest shot of the game, a cold-blooded 3 from the right wing with 20 ticks left to grab the lead. Credit Raymar Morgan as well. Despite his odd night statistically (3-3 from the field, 6 turnovers), he was able to penetrate just enough to grab some attention before setting up Summers for the game-winning bomb.

-Am I the only one that feels bad for Evander Holyfield? It sounds as if he was completely robbed in his majority decision loss to giant Nikolay Valuev on Saturday in Switzerland. I know the guy should probably not be fighting, and he is most likely damaging himself for later on in life, but he ought to get the W if he's earned it. Valuev was so passive during the bout that he was described to be "in a coma" for most of the fight, but somehow it was good enough to garner the necessary points from 2 of the 3 judges. I've always been a Holyfield guy. From an early age, I respected his toughness in handling much bigger heavyweights when he was naturally a cruiserweight. Maybe this will be the end of the road for the former champion. I always enjoyed watching him when he was at his best. It is frustrating that this bout will possibly send him out of the ring for the last time with a sour taste in his mouth...he deserves better.


What did you notice this weekend? Drop a comment here or Email your boy at highsockslegend@gmail.com