Not that Hope had a lot of room for a roster spot on the 2012-'13 Dallas Mavericks' season, but he officially has been released along with the other collection of stiffs the team has cut this season.
The Mavs are 26-33, and now seven wins behind Houston for eighth. No playoffs for the first time since 2000.
Two words. Draft. Party. The NBA draft lottery is May 21. The draft itself is June 27.
The Mavs will have a lottery selection - exactly where that spot is merely a guess. The last time they picked high was 1998, when they used the sixth pick on University of Michigan forward Robert "Tractor" Traylor. You may recall the team sent his rights to the Milwaukee Bucks for the rights to Pat Garrity, and some stiff named Dirk Nowitzki.
If the draft selections are based purely on record, meaning no team with an blah record slips into the top 3, the order will look like: 1. Charlotte 2. Orlando 3. Washington 4. Cleveland 5. Sacramento 6. New Olreans 7. Phoenix 8. Minnesota 9. Detroit 10. Oklahoma City (trade) 11. Philladelphia 12. DALLAS MAVERICKS 13. Phoenix 14. Charlotte
Picking No. 12 isn't exactly great. You are a lottery team in name only.
FORT WORTH, Texas - The first thing you notice about Johnny Manziel in person is that this is not a thin, little dude. This is a thick kid who looks like he can take a hit. He looks strong, with rather large hands. As Twitter follower @CourtnieWyche says, "He has a giant head, too!"
He is a legit 6-foot. Probably not an inch taller. In today's NFL, that's enough. And if you are Texas A&M, that has to make you a little nervous.
Manziel is in Fort Worth this evening to receive the 3,454th trophy he has been awarded for the 2012 season - the Davey O'Brien award.
Normally at his height he would stick around for three more years before looking at the NFL. Given how the little guys look like they can play quarterback in the NFL, we are likely looking at the last year of Manziel at College Station.
After the 2013 season, Manziel will be eligible to enter the NFL draft. He says he's not thinking about it, which is a total load. And he should. No one looking at a first-round signing bonus should ever pass.
"Right now it’s worrying about this upcoming season and if things, if you’re fortunate enough to get a chance to go to the NFL draft, then you get to send your stuff in and see how you would be evaluated, so when that time rolls around I guess we’ll worry about it then," Manziel said.
He says his priority is to do something that Texas A&M has never done before - win a national title. A real one. Not one of those bogus titles when only white guys plays white guys. Not one of those titles the school awarded itself last fall.
One year ago if someone told you a 6-foot quarterback could thrive in the NFL the normal response is Drew Brees. It can happen, but you should not plan for it. The success, and the style, of Seattle Seahawks rookie quarterback Russell Wilson (5-11, 206) has changed the way people may view Johnny Football.
Manziel said he is a fan of Wilson now.
"Being a shorter guy, a chance at the NFL at a high draft pick, that’s something that I’ve only every dreamed about," Manziel said. "I love A&M and I love everything about it, so when the time comes I think it will be a hard decision."
"You look at (Wilson) and what he’s done this year and how he played. You look at his stature and some of the things he’s done, it’s impressive," Manziel said. "The NFL is, like a lot of people, are changing. It’s changing. You look at guys who are mobile. You look at RGIII, Cam Newton, Russell Wilson, (Colin) Kaepernick. Kaepernick goes to the Super Bowl and he came out of nowhere. There’s a lot of things that can be done with more mobile guys. You’ve still have your (Tom) Brady and (Peyton) Manning and stuff like that, but I feel like the game’s changing a little bit."
Even if the uber-mobile QB is a fad Manziel's window is open so it would a surprise if he doesn't take advantage of it.
Twitter @MacEngelProf tengel@star-telegram.com Facebook Mac Engel
This is not what we had in mind when TCU joined the Big 12 - Bad vs. Really Bad.
On Tuesday night at Daniel-Meyer Coliseum, the TCU men's basketball team hosts the University of Texas in a game that still must be played. Texas is in eighth in the Big 12. TCU is 12th in a 10-team league.
TCU has lost three straight since upsetting No. 5 Kansas 62-55 on Feb. 6.
When TCU upset the Longhorns football team on Thanksgiving, all of UT nation felt shame. That point may have been the single most uncomfortable moment for Horns' coach Mack Brown.
It's one thing to be embarrassed (again) by Oklahoma in the Red River game in Dallas. It's quite another to lose at home against a squad of TCU freshmen, and a quarterback who was almost a running back.
Even though UT's football team was down, losing to that TCU team in Austin was a smack in the face.
Much like Mack Brown, UT men's basketball coach Rick Barnes is having his worst season in Austin since he arrived in 1998. The team can't score, there isn't enough talent, and the return of point guard Myck Kabongo from NCAA suspension is too late.
2.) Barnes coaches a sport that is not football. That really helps.
The Horns have six games remaining before the Big 12 tournament. Unless they win the conference tournament (they won't) the Horns are going to miss the NCAA tourney for the first time in the Barnes era. They can still post a winning record, and likely will be invited to one of those low tier tournaments that only gamblers watch.
There are soft whispers that perhaps Dodds should violate his own rules and fire a coach who is losing. UT would be dumb to fire a man who has done so much to build that program, but if Barnes wants to make sure his detractors remain at the fringe he would be wise not to lose to TCU.
Twitter @MacEngelProf tengel@star-telegram.com Facebook Mac Engel
Why in the name of Stupid was a vigil necessary? This was a case of students being dramatic for the sake of being dramatic. No need to create drama when it usually falls into your lap at the worst time.
One TCU undergrad received a phone call from her grandmother in Panama, who told her she was coming to get her and that she had to leave the school immediately.
One year later we know this giant drug bust wasn't a case of 18 Pablo Escobars running TCU's campus. Nearly all of these people received little punishments - $300 for court costs. Some deferred adjudication probation.
One year later we know the once pristine football team is not immune to the problems that befall most major college football teams.
One year later we know the only collateral from this has not been with the four football players directly involved but one who wasn't - quarterback Casey Pachall.
One year later we know, because this was indeed an isolated incident, that the program has not turned into The 1990's University of Miami Hurricanes (although for the sake of winning that may not be the worst thing).
One year later we know this was a story only because it involved four football players - defensive tackle D.J. Yendrey, defensive back Devin Johnson, linebacker Tanner Brock and offensive tackle Ty Horn.
According to Texas State University, Yendrey has spent the previous semester at the school and practiced with the team. He will have one year of eligibility remaining to play for the Bobcats under former TCU coach Dennis Franchione.
Brock has enrolled at Sam Houston State, and will have one year of eligibility to play.
The general reaction from the TCU student body was more of embarrassment more than shock. The vast majority of students I spoke with just assumed this sort of thing happens. Maybe not the dealing, but certainly some use. The people in and around TCU didn't much care for the news vans and the way this story was portrayed. These are the same people who would gladly consume such a story, and take a little glee, if it had happened in College Station, Waco or Lubbock.
One year later we know there was a little over-reaction to this story, but that both the school and the football team handled it the only way they could.
One year later, everybody has moved on. As they should.
Twitter @MacEngelProf tengel@star-telegram.com Facebook Mac Engel
TCU's first season in the Big 12 Conference has gone just about as good (or bad) as many of the coaches and administrators thought it would when it made this jump. The one sport the people around the school thought could immediately "hang" begins its schedule on Feb. 15, when the baseball team travels to play Ole Miss in Oxford, Mississippi for a three-game series.
Looking at the two athletic deparments and the "major" sports, here is how both TCU and West Virginia's first season in the Big 12 are going, compared against how each school performed in its previous conference last year.
TCU: '12-'13 Big 12 '11-'12 MWC Football: 7-6, 4-5 11-2, 7-0 M hoops: 10-14, 1-10 18-15, 7-7 W hoops: 7-15, 0-11 16-14, 9-5 Volleyball: 15-14, 4-12 25-7, 9-5 W soccer: 7-10-4, 1-5-2 7-11-1, 1-5
West Virginia: '12-'13 Big 12 '11-'12 Big East Football: 7-6, 4-5 10-3, 5-2 M hoops: 12-11, 5-5 19-14, 9-9 W hoops: 14-9, 6-6 24-10, 11-5 W soccer: 11-5-4, 7-0-1 17-5-0, 10-1 M soccer: 9-6-2, 4-2-1 11-8-1, 6-3-0 Volleyball: 8-22, 0-16 7-19, 5-9
Conclusion - It gets better. Ask Baylor.
Twitter @MacEngelProf tengel@star-telegram.com Facebook Mac Engel
FORT WORTH - Kansas coach Bill Self was wrong when he said his team played the worst half of basketball in the history of the program against TCU on Wednesday. Go with the worst half of basketball in the history of basketball.
In scoring 13 first-half points, KU missed close shots. Three-pointers. Guarded shots. Free throws. Layups. Putbacks. Bunnies. Garbage.
The best that the Big 12 has ever had to offer in the way of men's basketball is good, but down. The same can be said of the entire league. It was bound to happen. As the Big 10 finally improved - Indiana, Michigan, Michigan State and Ohio State are legit - the Big 12 finally slipped. When I say "slip" I mean Kansas is not dominant.
No team in the Top 25, let alone top 5, should have lost to that TCU team. A serious case can be made that TCU this season is the least-good team in the history of the league.
KU's embarrassing loss at TCU on Wednesday night can not be used to accurately predict the future, but there are other signs to think that this team will not be in the Elite Eight again. No Big 12 team looks like it will go beyond the Sweet 16.
The Jayhawks have nice players, but this is not a tough team. The Morris Twins, Thomas Robinson and Tyshawn Taylor gave KU at attitude over the past few seasons that other teams could not handle. Self doesn't have a point guard. Center Jeff Withey should be in the NBA forever, but he's not overpowering like Robinson. Kevin Young is active, but not skilled.
Freshman Ben McLemore is the most talented player on the floor, but he needs another year. Freshman Perry Ellis looks lost. Upperclassmen Travis Releford and Elijah Johnson are nice, veteran players but don't have the type of talent to create their own shots consistently adn take over a game.
Kansas is not bad, and historically Self's team improve as the season goes, but his team is limited in a way to suggest that the Big 12's tournament run will be short lived in 2013.
Twitter @MacEngelProf tengel@star-telegram.com Facebook Mac Engel
Not that anybody in Austin cares, but the University of Texas men's basketball team sucks. Maybe Jody Conradt can coach 'em up, because Rick Barnes can't do much worse.
The Longhorns got their butt whupped at No. 18 Kansas State on Wednesday night, 83-57. The Horns are now a healthy 9-11, 1-6 in the Big 12, and yet are still good enough to kick the blank out of TCU when the teams play on Feb. 2 in Austin.
The Horns are flying high to their first losing season under Barnes since he arrived in Austin in 1998. The only way this season is salvaged is if Kevin Durant returns to lead the Horns to a Big 12 conference tournament title and they reach the NCAA tournament for a 15th consecutive season.
The suspension of Myck Kabongo for taking impermissible benefits hasn't helped, but even had he played this team is still lacking.
The only thing saving Barnes right now is that college football signing day is Feb. 6, and that day is usually when football coach Mack Brown wins another championship. Also saving Barnes' butt is that he coaches a sport that the great people in the great state a Texas routinely marginalize.
Perhaps the only thing that will put Barnes in Bevo flop is if UT manages to lose to an awful TCU team either on Feb. 2 or in Fort Worth on Feb. 19.
Even then, however, any talk that Barnes should seriously be fired is inane. The man has done more to legitimize that program than any coach in the history of Texas basketball. The only time his teams at UT failed to win 20 games was his first season when they won 19, yet still reached the NCAA tournament.
Since he arrived, Texas has been the second-best team in the Big 12 to Kansas, which is one of the top five programs in the nation.
Barnes can recruit, and despite what his critics say, he can coach. You don't reach a Final Four and 14 consecutive NCAA tourneys because you don't know what you are doing.
This will be Texas' first losing season it finished 14-17 in 1997-'98, the last year under Tom Penders.
Barnes' teams have generally played hard, been clean, and usually win. This season has not been the norm.
The man has earned the right to have a bad year.
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On Sunday afternoon TCU head coach Gary Patterson was not sure if he was going to lose defensive end Stansly Maponga to the NFL draft, but he sounded like the announcement was coming.
On Monday afternoon, the announcement came. According to multiple reports, Maponga will skip his senior year to enter the draft.
GP told me all of the NFL scouts he has talked to said Maponga should stay in school for his senior year. There are nearly 20 quality defensive ends who are going to be available in this draft, and unless Maponga has a fantastic individual workout at TCU Pro Day, and/or NFL Combine, we are not talking about a first or second round pick.
If you are not a first or a second round pick, the guaranteed money drops fast.
Maponga is listed as 6-foot-2, 265 pounds. That's a little on the light side for a defensive end. He may be moved to outside linebacker, but he has never played in coverage.
It's a huge loss for TCU. Had he returned the Horned Frogs would have had Devonte Fields and Maponga as bookend rushers, easily the best pair in the Big 12.
This smells like another kid who simply does not want to go to school, which is his right.
@MacEngelProf tengel@star-telegram.com Facebook Mac Engel
The 2012 college football season is over and the amateur Alabama Crimson Tide are yet again national champions with a win so boring over "No. 1" Notre Dame that most of us turned it off by the third quarter.
Cut to it - here are a a few of the area related games we can't wait to see in 2013:
8/31 - TCU v. LSU, Cowboys Stadium. Whether this game is close depends if Casey Pachall is TCU's starting QB, and he has some line protection. If he's good, and TCU somehow wins, his draft stock should take off.
9/14 - Alabama at Texas A&M. Aggies handed Tide only loss in '12. The Aggies will be 2-0 and hosting the No. 1 Tide in what will be the biggest game in College Station in ... decades? This could be a No. 1 vs. No. 3.
9/28 - Oklahoma at Notre Dame. The Sooners lost at home against the Irish in '12 and with so much of ND returning another loss is likely for Stoops.
10/12 - Oklahoma v. Texas. This one Mack Brown can't afford to lose.
10/26 - Texas at TCU. Frogs won in Austin last year and Fort Worth will be primed for UT's first visit since the SWC days.
11/23 - Texas A&M at LSU. The Tigers play Alabama on Nov. 9 then have a bye before hosting the Aggies.
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FORT WORTH, Texas - The Google machine is a wonderful device to spread meanness as its vast empty space is the ideal location to spew hate with the luxury of hiding behind a fake name. Feelings be damned.
It's all "well and good" until you see the face of the person on the receiving end, in this case Baylor senior women's basketball player Brittney Griner. There has not been an athlete who has been on the receiving end of so much meanness in recent years as much as Griner, and it's all because she violates the unpardonable sin of not being hot.
There is not a bigger sin in sports a woman can commit than not looking like a cover candidate for Vogue. It's OK to be gay now, but for the love of God please be pretty.
Rather than offer some shallow judgement on her appearance just appreciate what she is - the best player her sport has ever had and an inspiration for tall young girls. She is, as TCU coach Jeff Mittie said, the "Wilt Chamberlain" of women's basketball, and worth the price to watch in person.
On Wednesday night in Fort Worth, Griner came to Fort Worth to play the Horned Frogs and I wanted to see what the fuss is all about with Brittney Griner. What I saw was a woman's basketball player who is not a man. Watching her play in person and then considering that idea is as preposterous as it is cruel.
If she just looked like Lisa Leslie, Cheryl Swoopes or Becky Hammon no one would be saying a thing other than commenting on her greatness. Swoopes was the most dominant player on her generation, and no one whispered about her gender.
The whole idea is just beyond mean.
What I saw was a young woman who very likely has been picked on for forever because of her height, and the resulting meanness has likely scarred her.
As to the name-calling and the meanness, Baylor coach Kim Mulkey said that has slowed down.
"We've controlled it more. I've controlled it better as a coach," Mulkey said. "Any time I hear something as a coach I have made a committment that I'm going to stop the game. I'm going to call a time out, or get security. There is no place for that. It has gotten so much better."
Now in her fourth year at Baylor, Griner is used to this. All of it. Good or bad.
Griner is accustomed to the double and triple teams, as well as the thousands who show up consistently to see Baylor play specifically because of her.
"I would say I'm kinda used to it," she said after Baylor defeated TCU on Wednesday night. "Sometimes I'm surprised a litlte bit. I just try to play as hard as I can and don't disappoint them."
She didn't; Griner dunked for the ninth time in her career on Wednesday night.
We have seen good and dominant women's basketball players before, but we have never seen a 6-foot-8, athletic woman who is blessed with good eye-hand coordination. That is what makes her so special.
"I never take that child for granted," Mulkey said. "I've never seen it before and I don't know if we'll ever see it again."
WATCH GRINER'S DUNK HERE -
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