Breaking: PGA -- We Just Saw The "Tiger" Shot Of The Year -- Sunday, April 1, 2024

Locator: 47052SPORTS.

PGA, the "Tiger" shot of the year.

• Scheffler.
• second hole.
• par 5 eagle
• from off the green -- way off the green.
  

Reminder: Talladega today at 2:00 p.m. I have no idea what network is "carrying" it but it does not matter. Hulu will have it.

NBA: I quit enjoying the NBA years ago when I noted that of all the sports I watch and enjoy, the referees play too big a role in the NBA to enjoy watching it any more. I assume most NBA sports fans would have disagreed. Now, today, in TWSJ, I have been vindicated. LOL.

Here's the headline:

Here's the lede:

Midway through this season, the NBA had a strange problem: Its players were too good. Teams were scoring more efficiently than ever, stars were putting up 60 and 70 points in a single game and there was absolutely nothing that defenses could do about it.

So the league set about fixing things.

In early March, basketball fans began to notice a subtle but consequential shift in the sport. Referees forgave a little more contact from defenders. They were more suspicious of star players who flopped and flailed on their way to the rim. And in a mid-March memo to teams, the NBA confirmed that its competition committee “continues to evaluate the state of offensive vs. defensive balance.”

Put simply: The NBA was making defense legal again.

If unable to connect the dots, maybe this will help. Near the end:

Even though this season’s shift didn’t involve any new rules being put on the books, coaches had spent the first part of the year clamoring for the adjustment they have lately seen.

In December, Golden State head coach Steve Kerr complained that star players were being allowed to “B.S. their way to the foul line.”

Those coaches got their wish.

In an April game, the Boston Celtics and Milwaukee Bucks set a mark that seemed unlikely a couple months before. The two teams combined to shoot just two free-throws—a record low in an NBA game. McCutchen noted that some scorers have been frustrated by the sudden disappearance of a friendly whistle. But over time, he expects that players and coaches will understand that these steps were taken for the overall health of the sport. 

Yeah, the NBA. It's all about the referees. No new rules. Simply "the league" telling the referees to start calling the game again.

Having said that, there is a rule or two, the NBA needs to change / eliminate.

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Taylor Swift for the Archives

As far as I can recall, not one group has ever released two "albums" at one time.

My hunch: several recording studios; several production companies working in parallel. If I were a Rolling Stone editor, I would want a lot of "behind-the-scenes" reporting. Many of the very best all-time hits were written in under six minutes but the producer took weeks to "release / complete" the final cut. To what extend was every "i" dotted and every "t" crossed before each individual song was considered complete?