Paul’s Blog

The Los Angeles Lakers defeated their bitter rivals, the Boston Celtics, in a heart stopping game 7 of the NBA Finals to win their 16th title. Despite a poor game from series MVP Kobe Bryant (6 for 24 from the field), the rest of the Lakers picked up the slack, most notably Ron Artest. Artest, who is flaky at the best of times, played effective defense on Paul Pierce and with one minute to go, unleashed a perfect 3 point shot that put the game on ice. After the game, Ron Ron gave the best post game interview in sports history, thanking his psychiatrist and talking about how he heard Phil’s voice in his head telling him not to shoot. He also found time to plug his new single, “Champion”.

Gasol hit a key shot down the stretch and Derek Fisher nailed a 3 that tied the game at 64 as the Lakers came back from being down 13 points at the 8 minute mark of the third quarter. The game ended in a flurry of 3’s as Wallace, Pierce, and Rondo all hit big shots to keep it close. In the end, two free throws by much maligned Sasha Vujacic provided the winning margin. While Kobe couldn’t score, he played tough D on Rondo and hauled in 15 rebounds. After averaging 28.6 points per game for the series, Bryant was awarded the Finals MVP award to go with his fifth NBA Championship.

Depending in the health and whim of head coach Phil Jackson (now the proud owner of 11 rings as coach), the Lakers may be a contender next year and for some time to come. Kobe, Gasol, Artest, and Lamar Odom are all signed for the next few years. The key will be the Zen Master — if Phil decides to tough out another year upon his courtside throne, he could end up with 4 threepeats, a feat almost certainly not to be duplicated.

Click on the image for a larger version.

The Ringside For Youth Event, held every year in Ottawa to benefit the Boys and Girls Club, had heavyweight champion Smokin’ Joe Frazier as their special guest this year. While the years have been hard on the champ, he was nothing short of gracious when interacting with his fans. As usual, the event organizers put on a fantastic event with great food, entertainment, and amateur boxing.

Smokin’ Joe took a few minutes to sit with me and sign a few things, including this watercolor:

Former heavyweight contender Gerry Cooney was also in attendance. He was especially friendly, working the room and going out of his way to accomodate pictures and autographs. He is a great supporter of the Ringside For Youth event.

The Fight of the Century was one of the rare sports events to actually live up to the hype as Frazier and Ali battled for 15 brutal rounds. Frazier knocked Ali down and became the first man to defeat Ali when he was awarded a unanimous decision.

Click on the images and photos for larger versions. More photos from the event can be seen here.

For the Daily Sketch Challenge at Outcast. Click on the image for a larger version.

Pencil on Strathmore 300 bristol, 11×17.

“The Smart Money” is a fascinating voyage through the world of big time sports betting. This is not the average fan betting $10 or even a $100 or a $1000 dollars on a football game, but a little-known subculture where $10,000, $20,000 and even $100,000 is wagered on the outcome of a sporting event and where gains and losses of half a million dollars over a weekend is commonplace. The author was drawn in to an exclusive club, the “Brain Trust”, who used inside knowledge of the teams, highly paid handicappers, and computers to determine what contests to bet on and how to beat the bookies at their own game.

Though it does not go into too much technical detail of the wagering process (i.e. the actual algorithms that the Brain Trust used to beat the system), this is a well written account of the author’s years working as an agent for a large betting cabal. His main responsibility was to find a way to place enough bets of high enough value to make it worthwhile which involved weekly trips to Las Vegas, hidden identities, and large bags containing bricks of cash. Once someone starts winning in Las Vegas, however, the casinos are no longer interested in taking your business. Yet, the Brain Trust was not to be denied, moving their action to offshore organizations where the seediness factor increases significantly.

Truly an inside look at a level of sports betting that the average fan never sees, “The Smart Money” weaves its way through the largely hidden labyrinth of how point spreads for football games are set and, more importantly, the mysterious forces that change these critical values during the week before the game and sometimes only minutes before kickoff.

After reading the first third of this book, which covered his first foray to Vegas to make bets, I doubted that the author could fill the rest of book with similar stories and keep the reader riveted. While the following seasons of betting and the move to using offshore accounts pretty much mirrors the action early in the book, it is told in such a style that it kept my interest right to the end. The author manages to realistically convey the tension and anxiety of large sums of money riding on a meaningless touchdown by a team that is hopelessly behind or the shock of watching an interception being returned for a score knowing that $50,000 was lost in that instant. I highly recommend this book to those who are interested in learning more about how sports betting actually works.

Click on the cover to go to Amazon.ca.

Having followed the NBA fairly closely and having read many sports books, I found “Seven Seconds or Less” to one of the best sports books I have ever read. A true insider’s view of the Phoenix Suns 2005-2006 season that covers the entire campaign but focuses on their playoff run to the Western Conference Finals. This book contains so many candid stories and analysis, I am surprised it was written in this day and age of sensitive superstars and cautious-to-a-fault coaches and management. Entertainingly penned and a thoroughly engaging read, McCallum shows he can do a long form book as well as he can handle articles for Sports Illustrated.

As a Laker fan, it was fascinating to read the inside story of the Suns comeback from being down 3-1 in their first round playoff series against Los Angeles. Many of my opinions regarding NBA players (Shawn Marion, especially) were confirmed. Even if you are not a fan of the Suns, if you enjoy the NBA, you must read this book.