Quote of the day
"When it comes down to a field goal at the last second, you can always point to play here, a play there, but it really doesn't do much for you. We're a forward-thinking operation, and we'll learn from this thing and move forward." -- Oregon coach Chip Kelly Daily blurb
Not quite the offensive explosion we were told to expect. I suspect the 5-week layoff contributed to the lower score – both because 5-weeks with no game action is a long time to keep offenses clicking, and because that’s a long time to “coach up” defenses for a specific game plan. Either way, any college football title game that goes down to the wire with the number of twists and turns of this one has to be considered a good one.
The NBA offered limited action last night, no doubt in deference to college football. The Celtics dropped their second consecutive home game, this time to Houston. Their 9 losses now ties them with Miami, and the Heat now seemed positioned to take the top seed in the East, having lost only once since the end of November, going 21-1 over that span. I guess Erik Spoelstra can stop looking over his shoulder for Pat Riley.
I just took a quick look at the top NBA players over the past 30 days using the RH salcap point formula. You have to go down to the #11 spot to get the 4th guard, but other than that, the top producers form a properly configured RotoHog roster with a current cost of almost $79m and an average RSCP/G of 45. There are a few teams that can already afford that roster size, and many more that are on the verge – so chasing the dollar may already be of diminished impact. Notably, the top player is LeBron and the top guard is Wade, which helps to explain the previous paragraph. It’s also notable that the preseason consensus top fantasy draft pick, Kevin Durant, currently falls out of the top ten players.