SwampSwamiSports.com

Let’s be honest.  The NBA’s 82-game regular season is a six month slog.

It begins in the obscurity of October, navigates through the “Nobody cares” month of November, dawdles through December, and jogs its way through the month of January.

The NFL mercifully exits the primary sports stage beginning in February.

Basketball finally has the spotlight!

Most hoops fans, though, prefer to focus on their favorite college basketball teams as they compete for a spot in the NCAA March Madness tournament.  The NBA regular season continues to plod along without much media attention.

The arrival of April means that the National Basketball Association’s nearly invisible regular season is almost complete.  The league’s thirty teams will have played for six months in relative obscurity.

Though the NBA executives will never admit it, the majority of the NBA’s regular season games are played with less than full intensity by both teams – especially on defense.

Except for one team this past season.

The Oklahoma City Thunder should be renamed the “OKC Tornado” for their devastating intensity in blasting NBA competitors for the entire basketball season.

OKC won the most games in the NBA’s regular season (68-14 or 83%).  They obliterated the NBA’s Western Conference by finishing a whopping 16 games ahead of the second place Houston Rockets at season’s end.

The Tornado (oops – Thunder) zoomed to the top of the NBA by out hustling their competition and playing solid defense in every game.  OKC was #3 in the NBA in scoring defense allowing a little more than 107 points per game.

They also scored over 120 points per game on offense.  That’s a 13-point differential over an 82-game season.

The two Eastern Conference finalists (the New York Knicks and the Indiana Pacers) posted an average winning margin of just four points and two points respectively.

The post-season months of April and May have found OKC’s defense remaining rock solid by allowing the same 107 points per game.  The Thunder’s offense is scoring three points fewer in the playoffs (117 ppg) which still equates to an impressive 10-point per game differential.

This translates into Oklahoma City’s sterling post-season winning percentage. 

They are now 12-3 (80%) in the playoffs after downing Memphis (4-0), Denver (4-2) and, yesterday, the Minnesota Timberwolves (4-1) to capture the NBA’s Western Conference title.

The Oklahoma City Thunder are heading for the NBA Finals next week for the first time since 2012.

This NBA franchise has been around the league longer than you might think

The Oklahoma City Thunder has been playing in the Sooner State for 17 seasons.  Their history begins back in 1967.

The team was originally founded as the Seattle Supersonics. 

The NBA’s Seattle Supersonics were an expansion franchise which started play in 1967.

Seattle’s Sonics even won an NBA title in 1979.

During the early 2000’s, the Seattle NBA team’s ownership had trouble getting the city and its voters to pony-up to build a shiny new basketball facility for the team. (Sound familiar?)

Meanwhile, the NBA’s New Orleans Hornets were forced to quickly find a temporary home in August, 2005 after the city was devastated by Hurricane Katrina that summer.

Oklahoma City welcomed the Hornets with open arms and very large and enthusiastic sell-out crowds.

A local group of investors led by Clay Bennett (who had previously worked for the San Antonio Spurs) and leaders of a few of Oklahoma’s largest energy companies cut a deal to purchase the Seattle Supersonics NBA team for $350 million in 2007.

The NBA franchise was relocated to Oklahoma City (America’s #45 TV market) beginning in 2008 and changed its nickname from Supersonics to the Thunder.

Seattle has been unsuccessful in its attempts to lure another NBA team back to the Pacific Northwest and America’s 14th largest TV market.

How the Thunder Rolls

The new Oklahoma City Thunder team hit the proverbial jackpot after arriving in the Sooner state.

Seattle had drafted the young rising star Kevin Durant from the University of Texas.  The first NBA draft made as the new Oklahoma City Thunder saw talented guard Russell Westbrook of UCLA added in the first round.

Next season found OKC with the third overall selection.

The team drafted high scoring guard James “The Beard” Harden from the University of Arizona.

This trio became the foundation for the youthful Oklahoma City Thunder.  OKC made it into the NBA Finals in 2012 but lost to LeBron James and Dwayne Wade’s Miami Heat in just five games.

The team traded James Harden to Houston shortly after OKC’s appearance in the NBA Finals.  Harden had become upset that the Thunder’s management failed to offer him the NBA maximum contract extension. He wanted out.

A few years later, it was Kevin Durant who also bailed from Oklahoma City by joining the Golden State Warriors.  Ouch again.

Guard Russell Westbrook would stick around long enough to win the NBA’s Most Valuable Player award in 2018, but OKC’s days near the top of the NBA standings were fading fast.

Oklahoma City acquired a few established NBA stars such as Paul George and Carmelo Anthony, but none seemed to mesh very well with Russell Westbrook (who liked the basketball to remain in his hands).

Russell Westbrook was eventually traded to the Houston Rockets in 2019 for point guard Chris Paul. OKC’s original trio of stars were all gone.

OKC changes directions and finds success by rebuilding from the ground up

Trading away your team’s top stars means that management must make the best of its future draft choices and free agent acquisitions.

The Oklahoma City Thunder traded away nearly every veteran on its roster.  The summer of 2021 found OKC with an incredible 36 future draft picks (18 first rounders and 18 second round selections) over the next seven years.

Oklahoma City wheeled and dealed to hit the proverbial jackpot over the past several years during its recent ascension to the top of the NBA’s Western Conference.

Here’s how the team acquired a few of this season’s top players:

Shai Gilgeous Alexander – the lanky 6’6” former University of Kentucky guard was initially selected by the Clippers but acquired by OKC in the Paul George trade in 2019.

Alexander has blossomed into a major star in Oklahoma City.  He averaged more than 32 points per game this season and recently was named the NBA’s Most Valuable Player.

Jalen Williams – Another “Who Dat?” player name.  The 6’5” Williams played three seasons at Santa Clara University and was drafted in the first round by OKC in 2022.  His scoring average rose to 21 points per game this year during his third NBA season with the Thunder.

Chet Holmgren – The 7’1” razor thin “power forward” from Gonzaga has a listed weight of just 208 pounds.  He was selected by OKC in the same 2022 NBA draft as Jalen Williams.

Holmgren is averaging 16 points, 8 rebounds and three blocked shots per game in the 2025 NBA playoffs. He is a surprisingly effective 3-point shooter, too.

Alex Caruso – The former Texas A&M guard went undrafted by the NBA in 2016.  He played semi-pro for the Oklahoma City Blue of the NBA’s Development League and eventually worked his way onto the NBA rosters of the Los Angeles Lakers and, later, the Chicago Bulls. 

OKC acquired Caruso via trade last summer.  He quickly became the team’s defensive leader in slowing down the opponents’ top scoring guards.

Don’t forget about the coach!

The Oklahoma City Thunder’s head coach may be even more “invisible” than most of his players.

The 40-year old Mark Daigneault became the team’s head after his former boss, Billy Donovan, was fired.

Daigneault was the head coach of the NBA Development League’s Oklahoma City Blue for five seasons.  He coached current OKC player Alex Caruso during one of those seasons.

Mark Daigneault was promoted to the OKC Thunder coaching staff in 2016.  He succeeded Billy Donovan as the team’s head coach coinciding with the organization’s intentional rebuilding period in 2020.

Daigneault was named the NBA’s “Coach of the Year” last season in 2024.

Will Oklahoma City win their first NBA title soon?

The New York Knicks are trailing the Indiana Pacers 3-1 entering tonight’s game 5 in New York City.  Both the Knicks and Pacers went 0-2 against OKC during the NBA’s regular season.

That doesn’t bode well for either team.  Indiana (as highlighted here a couple of weeks ago) is playing to win the franchise’s first NBA title since joining the league in 1976.

The New York Knicks haven’t won an NBA title since Willis Reed, Walt Frazier, and Earl “The Pearl” Monroe’s 1973 championship team.

Oklahoma City will have the home court advantage in the NBA Finals after posting the league’s best record. 

They have one of the loudest home crowds in the league along with one of the most gritty defenses.

It will be difficult to stop the Thunder’s roll come June.

The post How the OKC Thunder Rolls appeared first on SwampSwamiSports.com.

I don’t particularly like being a doom and gloom guy when discussing any major sport.  Having less to write and talk about is definitely not good for this Southern sports guy.

The second season of the United Football League’s (UFL) spring football has been a downright disaster which very few people seem to care about right now.

The stats don’t lie. 

In-stadium attendance and national television ratings for the UFL in 2025 indicate that this spring pro football league is bound for the sports graveyard soon.

The first eight weeks of the 2025 UFL season have been disastrous in terms of in-stadium home attendance.

Only the St. Louis Battlehawks (29,500/game), DC Defenders (13,700/game), and Michigan Panthers (10,600) are averaging more than 10,000 tickets sold per game through eight weeks of the UFL’s 10-game regular season.

Most of the other five teams in this league (Arlington (TX), Birmingham, Houston, Memphis, and San Antonio) have not been able to crack 10,000 fans for even one home game in 2025.

This season’s week-by-week average attendance is down by more than 10% from last year’s paltry weekly totals.

The trend is not the UFL’s friend in 2025.

Why is the UFL floundering in the South?

The Birmingham Stallions have won their last three seasons in spring football. 

They won the first two years in the now-defunct USFL and then captured the first UFL (a merger of the fiscally thrifty USFL and the money-consuming XFL beginning in 2024) title last summer.

In three home games played in 2025, the defending champion Birmingham Stallions are averaging less than 8,000 paying customers.

The states of Alabama, Texas and Tennessee are considered to among the most robust markets in college football.

But college football is played during the fall as temperatures are starting to cool down.

The UFL, though, plays its games during the months of April, May, and June when outdoor temperatures in Southern states are rising by the week.

Who wants to watch minor league football being played outside when you are sitting in a nearly empty football stadium with 90-degree temperatures and steamy humidity?

St. Louis also gets hot and humid at this time of year.  The Battlehawks (along with Michigan and San Antonio) play inside of a domed stadium providing air-conditioned comfort.

The primary reason why football fans in the city of St. Louis have embraced the UFL’s Battlehawks was to send a message to the NFL.  You may remember that the St. Louis Rams slinked out of town and moved to Los Angeles in 2016.

St. Louis desperately wants another chance to become the home of an NFL franchise.

When you remove St. Louis’ healthy attendance, the other seven UFL teams are averaging a meager 9,000 paying fans per home game.

UFL ticket prices average about $25.  That equates to home team revenue (for non-St. Louis UFL teams) of about $225,000 per game.

The cost of players alone ($5,500/week for 45 active players = $247,500) is not being covered by seven of the eight UFL teams though Week #8 in 2025.

It gets worse.  Television viewership is dropping, too

The UFL’s four game weekly schedule is being televised by major football networks such as ABC, ESPN, and FOX.

NFL regular season games attract anywhere from 15 to 20 million viewers on those same networks.

The UFL 2025 regular season games are averaging a paltry 621,000 television viewers per game. 

UFL Week #8 showed 32% fewer television viewers than the same week in 2024.

Ouch, indeed!

FOX decided to give the UFL a weekly Friday evening 7PM Central prime time slot this spring in hopes of building an loyal viewing audience.

Week #1’s 690,000 viewing audience remains the high water mark in 2025.  Week #8 saw the FOX Friday Night UFL viewership decline to 573,000.

That’s a 17% slide from the beginning of the spring football season.

The UFL believes that competition from other major sports has hampered interest in their spring football product.

Perhaps it is more likely that the UFL’s owners convinced themselves into believing that America had a pent-up demand for spring professional football.

Let’s talk about the competition for spring TV sports viewers

The NFL is the Godzilla of televised sports in America.

The owners of the UFL (Fox Sports and a group led by Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson) believed their spring professional football product should easily capture at least one million television viewers per game for its relatively short 10-week regular season schedule.

The competition for television viewership during the spring primarily comes from an assortment of other sports.  None approaches the massive popularity of the NFL and college football in the fall.

The NBA’s never-ending three months of playoffs (April, May, and June) have finally moved into the Eastern and Western Conference finals this week. 

Recent television ratings for the NBA playoffs have been as high as five million per game.  June’s best-of-seven NBA Finals may double that number if one or more of the teams is located in a major US television market such as New York City.

Major League Baseball began its lengthy six-month 162-game regular season schedule from April through September.  TV ratings for early-season baseball rarely top 1.5 million viewers.  Baseball’s viewership has been declining for decades.

The PGA Tour on CBS and NBC regularly attract a spring weekend audience of more than two million viewers.  Major golf championships such as The Masters and PGA Championship usually double that number.

The National Hockey League mirrors the NBA with its lengthy three-month post-season schedule. 

This year’s 2025 NHL playoff games have seen a 25% decline in television viewership.  An average audience of about 800,000 has been watching televised hockey playoffs on either ESPN and TNT.

That means that the NHL (while declining in numbers) is still significantly ahead of the UFL spring football games in terms of television viewers.

Why hasn’t the UFL caught on with fans after two years?

The eight UFL teams do not produce as much offensive firepower as the NFL nor do the teams possess enough offensive stars to attract more fan interest.

This season has produced just four 300-yard passing games in 32 regular season games played through Week #8.  Only five 100-yard running performances have been posted during the same period.

UFL spring games are (generally) lower scoring than their NFL counterparts.

The top scoring UFL team in 2025 has been the 6-3 Michigan Panthers at 25 points per game.  The lowly 2-7 Memphis Showboats are last with just 15 points per outing.

Let’s compare that to regular season scoring in the NFL last year.  The 15-2 Detroit Lions led the way in 2024 by averaging 33 points per game. Cleveland (3-14 last year) scored 15 points per week.

The vast majority of UFL football players will never play a down in the NFL.  That doesn’t mean that the players are not very talented.  Many were initially drafted by NFL teams or have participated in NFL training camps.

Paying customers at UFL stadiums and fans watching at home must invest significant time to become familiar with each team’s players.

Some players came from “name” college football programs, but the majority played for schools in lesser known conferences.

The NFL dream is still on the minds of most UFL players

Most UFL players hope to be invited to an NFL training camp once the league’s season ends in mid-June.

The majority will not receive that phone call, though.

The UFL would greatly benefit from becoming a developmental league for the NFL.  Having tie-ins with a cluster of NFL teams would bring more fan interest to this spring league.

The NFL has chosen to watch the UFL from afar and not invest in the product.  Yet.

The cost of operations for the UFL has proven to be unsustainable with faltering television ratings and even weaker in-stadium attendance.

Perhaps the NFL is waiting for the UFL’s current owners to waive the white flag of surrender in order to buy the league for peanuts.

More likely, the NFL’s billionaire owners are hoping that the upstart UFL (like so many failed spring football ventures) will fold under mounting financial pressures and become another name for sports history books.

There’s nothing quite like being a virtual monopoly!

The post The UFL is in a Death Spiral appeared first on SwampSwamiSports.com.

Prior to the recent NFL draft, we heard that the New Orleans Saints were likely to draft a quarterback in the opening rounds.

That’s because veteran Derek Carr had a “mysterious shoulder injury” which might keep him sidelined for the entire 2025 NFL season.

On Saturday, we learned that Derek Carr will not be playing football in the NFL at all – ever again.

The 34-year old starting quarterback for the New Orleans Saints surprised many by announcing his retirement from pro football effective immediately.

Derek Carr’s throwing shoulder has not healed very well in the off-season.  Doctors said that the shoulder is showing significant degenerative issues.

Unless Derek Carr is ambidextrous (he isn’t), the New Orleans Saints’ very expensive $37.5 million per year starting quarterback is now permanently unavailable.

The Saints will “just” owe Derek Carr his $10 million signing bonus in 2025 if the quarterback files his official NFL retirement papers before the end of the month.

It could have been worse (financially speaking) if Derek Carr had waited to announce his retirement later this summer.  By retiring in May, he saved the Saints about $30 million in salary.

Derek Carr’s contract with the Saints ($150 million over four years) has already cost the team more than $75 million in 2023 and 2024.

His two years in New Orleans yielded season records of just 9-8 and 5-12.

That’s only a 41% winning percentage for a team which spent more money than the NFL salary cap allowed each year.

This is the second Carr whose NFL QB career fizzled quickly

Derek Carr’s older brother David became the #1 overall draft pick of the expansion Houston Texans in 2002.

David Carr played college football at Fresno State – just like his younger brother would do, too.  He earned All-America honors and the Johnny United Golden Arm award for being judged as the best quarterback in college football.

The older Carr played behind a horrible offensive line with the expansion Houston Texans in the team’s inaugural season.  He was sacked an NFL record 76 times during his rookie year in 2002.

Holy ambulance, Batman!

That was nearly five sacks per game.

As legendary radio broadcaster Casey Kasem often said, “And the hits continue!”

Houston Texans quarterback David Carr was sacked an incredible 249 times during his first five NFL seasons.  That was 3.3 sacks per game over five years.

The jittery quarterback understandably lost his nerve while playing human punching bag for the lowly Houston Texans.

David Carr would be traded to Carolina, San Francisco, and the New York Giants before mercifully ending his NFL career after 11 seasons.

Ironically, his younger brother Derek Carr’s NFL career also lasted just 11 years.

The Derek Carr debacle was the fault of Saints General Manager Mickey Loomis

Nobody in New Orleans expected Derek Carr to become the next Drew Brees.

Derek Carr’s nine years playing with the Raiders in Oakland and Las Vegas produced only two winning seasons and one playoff appearance.  Carr pocketed a few hundred million dollars, though, over his nine years with the Raiders.

None of Derek Carr’s statistics with the Raiders indicated he would blossom into a future Hall-of-Famer.

He averaged nearly one interception per game with the Raiders.

Carr completed passes for an average of just seven yards per attempt during his career.  That ranks in the bottom third of NFL quarterbacks during recent years.

What did New Orleans Saints General Manager Mickey Loomis see in Derek Carr to justify offering him a $150 million contract for four seasons?

Derek Carr performed just about the same in New Orleans as he did with the Raiders. His winning percentage was mediocre with both franchises.

New Orleans Saints fans could see this debacle coming. Why didn’t GM Mickey Loomis?

Derek Carr has a nice young family and is looking forward to spending more time with the wife and kids in the future.

He has more money in the bank today than Jed Clampett had in Mr. Drysdale’s Commerce Bank of Beverly Hills during the late 1960’s.

Carr will be just fine.

The New Orleans Saints, though, seem to be adrift at sea.

Saints select Louisville quarterback Tyler Shough in Round 2 of the NFL Draft

The first thing most of us Saints fans asked was, “Who Dat?”

Tyler Shough (whose name is pronounced “Shuck”) played for three different college football teams over a six-year period.  He sat on the bench at Oregon behind current Chargers’ quarterback Justin Herbert.

With three years of eligibility left, Tyler Shough transferred to pass-happy Texas Tech. He broke a collar bone early in the 2021 football season – his first with the Red Raiders.

The next year Tyler Shough injured his left shoulder early in the 2022 season but eventually returned later to finish the season as the starting quarterback.

The 2023 season in Lubbock saw quarterback Tyler Shough go down with a broken fibula (lower leg) in Week #4.

Notice any trends yet?

Tyler Shough never played another game for Texas Tech in 2023 and hit the transfer portal as soon as the Raiders’ regular season ended.

His sixth year in college (due to all of his major injuries) was played at the University of Louisville.

Tyler Shough finally played a full season as the starting quarterback for a major college football team.  He performed well with 32 touchdowns, only nine interceptions, and led Louisville to an 8-4 regular season record last fall in 2024.

Where was Tyler Shough when Louisville played in their post-season Sun Bowl game against the University of Washington?

He had already quit the team in order to prepare for this spring’s NFL draft.

Who was this selfish oft-injured player drafted by?

You guessed it – General Manager Mickey Loomis and the New Orleans Saints.

Tyler Shough may have a decent chance to become the Saints starting quarterback this fall if he can beat last year’s back-up quarterback, Spencer Rattler.

Did you hear about the Saints’ latest quarterback signing this week?

Former Iowa State quarterback Hunter Dekkers was caught betting on college football games (including a $15 bet on Iowa State to win) in 2022.

He didn’t bet just one time. Dekkers bet a total of 366 times during his three seasons (mostly as a back-up quarterback) at Iowa State.

Hunter Dekkers pleaded guilty to underage gambling.  The quarterback was banished by the NCAA after the 2022 college football season.

Dekkers sat out one season but returned last fall to play college football at tiny Iowa Western Community College in Council Bluffs – just across the river from Omaha, Nebraska.

Yes, Hunter Dekkers was academically eligible to play – for a junior college – in 2024.

Let that sink in for a moment.

Dekkers led Iowa Western to an 11-2 record last fall. 

The Reivers (River Pirates) lost in the National Junior College Athletic Association title game to Hutchinson Community College of Kansas.

The New Orleans Saints General Manager Mickey Loomis signed the undrafted Hunter Dekkers to a free agent contract on Monday.

His press release by the Saints failed to mention that Dekkers had been given the heave-ho by the NCAA following his guilty plea to gambling on college football games.

Can Saints fans trust General Manager Mickey Loomis anymore?

The Saints are without a seasoned starting quarterback with successful NFL experience.  The team has assembled a group of young, hungry, and quite inexperienced quarterbacks.

None of the Saints’ young pups at quarterback produced notable success in college.

Why should New Orleans Saints fans believe that any of them will emerge as an NFL star in the next year or two?

Spencer Rattler enters his second year with the Saints.

The former South Carolina (via Oklahoma) quarterback was a fifth round selection in 2024.  He went 0-6 as the Saints starting quarterback last fall after Derek Carr’s season-ending injury.

The Saints maintained that Derek Carr was dealing with a “mysterious” shoulder injury for weeks prior to the NFL college football draft.

Carr waited until after the NFL draft to announce his retirement last week.

Second round selection Tyler Shough and free agent quarterback Hunter “You can bet on me” Dekkers have been signed by the New Orleans Saints in the past month.

Both have questionable college football resumes and even more questionable leadership skills at the professional level.

Is veteran NFL QB Aaron Rodgers coming to play for the Saints?

Aaron Rodgers (now 42 years old) has one Super Bowl ring and is a three-time NFL Player of the Year.  He played the past two seasons for the New York Jets with little success.

Rodgers and his agent have been shopping his future services to anyone with a fat wallet.  He continues to play footsie with the Pittsburgh Steelers this spring but remains a free agent as of this post.

The New Orleans Saints have a clear opening at quarterback entering this fall.

General Manager Mickey Loomis has proven that he is willing to spend a lot of money on questionable quarterback decisions.  Team owner Gayle Benson continues to show confidence in Loomis as if he was the primary reason why the Saints won their lone Super Bowl 15 years ago.

He wasn’t.  The Saints won despite Loomis’ oft-times questionable personnel decisions.

Would it surprise anyone if Aaron Rodgers winds-up in New Orleans this fall with a big fat 2-year contract?

Me, either.

The post Saints Burned at the Used Carr lot appeared first on SwampSwamiSports.com.

It is hard to believe that the Indiana Pacers’ last basketball title came in the defunct American Basketball Association in 1973.

Actually, all three of the Indianapolis-based professional basketball team’s championship trophies came during its nine years as an original member of the ABA.  The Indiana Pacers won the ABA championship in 1970, 1972, and 1973.

That last title came three years before the Pacers (along with the Denver Nuggets, San Antonio Spurs, and the New York/New Jersey/Brooklyn Nets) were merged into the NBA in 1976.

The next 49 years of professional basketball in NBA have produced nothing to put in the trophy case for the state’s beloved Pacers.

You might think that the Indiana Pacers have been a perpetual loser during that stretch of time.

However, you would be wrong.

This franchise endured a very rough start after joining the NBA.  The Pacers posted just one winning season in their first ten NBA seasons from 1976-1985.

The next 39 seasons have found the Indiana Pacers posting a winning record 21 times.  Including this year, the Pacers have now appeared in the NBA playoffs 28 times during those 39 years.

The Indiana Pacers have only reached the NBA Finals one time since joining the NBA back in 1976.  The 2000 Pacers team lost to the Shaquille O’Neal-led Los Angeles Lakers by a 4-2 margin.

The Pacers are 0-NBA in championships, but this year feels different!

This year’s NBA has produced a couple of surprise regular season Conference winners which are both struggling to stay alive in the playoffs right now.

Most basketball fans would not have selected Cleveland to win the NBA Eastern Conference regular season nor Oklahoma City to win the West by a whopping 16 games ahead of the #2 seed Houston Rockets.

OKC lost their Game 1 at home and is tied at 2 games apiece in the Thunder’s NBA Western Conference semifinal against the 2023 NBA champion Denver Nuggets (there’s that ABA connection again!).

The surprising Eastern Conference #4 seed Indiana Pacers have the #1 team in their conference on the ropes ropes right now.

Sunday night’s first half for the Indiana Pacers produced a blistering 80 points and a 41-point halftime advantage over a stunned Cleveland Cavaliers team.

That 80-39 halftime advantage tied an NBA record for the largest halftime lead in a playoff game.

The 129-109 final score failed to reflect Indiana’s total domination of this game as the bench warmers played most of the second half minutes for both teams.

The surprising Pacers are now leading 3-1 in this best-of-seven NBA series.

Cleveland came into this series after a 4-0 sweep of the Miami Heat.  The Cavaliers have found the Indiana Pacers to be a much more worthy opponent.

Indiana basketball coach Rick Carlisle is not patting his team on the back, either.

After Sunday night’s demolition of Cleveland, coach Carlisle said, “We haven’t done anything yet!”

Pacers coach Rick Carlisle knows about winning NBA championships!

Rick Carlisle won NBA titles both as a player with the Boston Celtics (1986) and as an NBA coach with the Dirk Nowitzki-led Dallas Mavericks (2011).

He played on the same Boston Celtics teams with Hall-of-Famers Larry Bird, Kevin McHale, and Robert Parish.

Carlisle (a back-up shooting guard as an NBA player) decided to become an NBA assistant coach at the youthful age of 30.

His first apprenticeship was working for his former Celtics mentor, Bill Fitch, who had recently become the head coach of the New Jersey Nets.  Carlisle spent five years as an assistant coach with the Nets before taking a similar role working for Coach P.J. Carlisimo in Portland.

Rick Carlisle then received his first head coaching assignment in 2001 with the Detroit Pistons.  During his two seasons as the top man in Detroit, Coach Carlisle’s teams won the NBA Central Division title but lost both times prior to reaching the NBA Finals.

Larry Legend lures Rick Carlisle to the Indiana Pacers

Carlisle was then reunited with his former teammate Larry Bird in the summer of 2003.

The Boston Celtics legend had just been named the Indiana Pacers President of Basketball Operations.

Larry Bird hired Rick Carlisle to become the team’s new head coach.

The Pacers made the NBA playoffs three times during Rick Carlisle’s four seasons as the head coach.

Coach Carlisle took a year off and worked as a studio analyst during ESPN’s coverage of the NBA.

Rick Carlisle returns to lead the Dallas Mavericks to their first NBA title

The coach returned to the NBA sidelines once again in 2008 as head coach for the Dallas Mavericks.

Carlisle’s new team featured a future Hall-of-Fame player who desperately wanted to win his first NBA championship.

Dirk Nowitzki was entering his early 30’s as Carlisle took over the job in Big D.  Their first few seasons together saw more heartaches as those pesky San Antonio Spurs (another former ABA team) knocked Dallas out of the playoffs twice.

In 2011, the Dallas Mavericks finally persisted to reach the NBA Finals to face LeBron James, Dwayne Wade, and the heavily favored Miami Heat. 

This time, Dirk Nowitzki, Coach Carlisle, and the city of Dallas celebrated the Mavericks’ first NBA title by surprising Miami four games to two in the NBA Finals.

Coach Rick Carlisle’s 13-year stint in Dallas continued to bring several more trips into the playoffs but no additional championship rings.

Rick Carlisle decided to return home again to Indiana as the head coach of the Pacers beginning in June, 2021.

Carlisle’s Pacers have posted an improvement in their regular season record every year.  This year’s 2024/2025 team with a tidy regular season mark of 50-32 to finish fourth overall in the NBA’s Eastern Conference.

The Indiana Pacers still have a long way to go to win their first NBA title

The state of Indiana loves its basketball. 

The classic movie “Hoosiers” accurately depicted Indiana’s fervent support for basketball.

This season’s Indiana Pacers team has fans in the state’s capital city practically giddy about their chances of winning their first NBA title since joining the league in 1976.

The Indiana Pacers team averaged 117 points per game in the regular season to rank as the NBA’s seventh best offense.  They allowed 115 points per game defensively to rank #17 out of the NBA’s 30 teams.

The 2025 Playoff Pacers have widened both of those margins.

Indiana’s offense is up one point to 118 points per game.  The defense is yielding 113 ppg in the first few weeks of the NBA playoffs.

The Indiana Pacers have won seven of their first nine playoff games.  They crushed #5 seed Milwaukee by a 4-1 margin in Round 1 and now lead the #1 East seed Cavaliers 3-1 heading into Tuesday night’s Game 5 in Cleveland.

These 2025 Playoff Pacers are on fire with deadly accuracy on offense.

The team is currently averaging 50% shooting from the field with an exceptional 40% accuracy from behind the 3-point line.  Six Indiana players are averaging in double figures with two more Pacers players averaging nine points per game.

Let’s assume that the Indiana Pacers subdue Cleveland soon and win this series

The next challenge will be either the NBA defending champion Boston Celtics (the #2 seed this year) or the #3 seed New York Knicks.  The surprising Knicks took a three games to one lead on Monday in that Eastern Conference semifinal series.

The Indiana Pacers won two of their three encounters with Boston in the regular season.  The New York Knicks hold a 2-1 edge over the Pacers this season.

The Pacers finished the regular season by winning eight of their final ten games.  They have won seven of their first nine playoff games.

This Indiana Pacers team is definitely on a roll at just the right time coming down the home stretch of the NBA season.

But there is also a long way to go before the Indiana Pacers and their hopeful fans may get another shot at the city’s first NBA title a month from now.

The team must stay focused on winning – one game at a time.

As Coach Rick Carlisle might say, “Pace yourself, Indiana!”

The post Rick Carlisle tells his Indiana team – “Pace yourselves!” appeared first on SwampSwamiSports.com.

The National Hockey League allowed the Arizona Coyotes franchise to relocate in Salt Lake City last summer.

Their nickname “Coyotes” fit nicely with the Arizona geography and was a great match for that region’s hockey team.

Unfortunately, the team’s ownership did a really lousy job.  Local fans abandoned the team in droves during the final few seasons in the desert.

Last summer found the moving vans loading-up the former Coyotes out of Arizona into the welcoming open arms of Salt Lake City, Utah.  The city has a metro population of about 1.25 million people and ranks as the #33 television market.

NHL hockey had finally arrived in Utah!

The state likely has its share of coyotes, but the name “Utah Coyotes” or “Salt Lake City Coyotes” just didn’t sound like a very good match for this city. 

Salt Lake City is tucked in the Wasach Mountains and lures multitudes of skiers during the winter months.

The new NHL team in Salt Lake City borrowed a page from the NFL

The hockey team’s ownership smartly took a cue from the former Washington Redskins of the National Football League. 

That famed football franchise temporarily changed its nickname to the Washington Football Team for the 2020 and 2021 NFL seasons.

In 2022, the Washington Commanders (ugh) debuted with the team’s current nickname.

Washington’s pro football fans suggested a number of clever names such as the Redtails, Warriors, Hogs, and Presidents.  A relatively safe choice of “Commanders” was selected by team ownership.

In a similar move, the new “Utah Hockey Club” began the 2024-2025 NHL season in Salt Lake City.

The team conducted a contest for a permanent nickname after coming to Utah.  More than 850,000 votes were cast over the past year in four rounds of voting.

The finalists were:

Utah Outlaws

The Utah Yeti

Utah Hockey Club (leave it as it was this season)

The Utah Mammoth

And the winner is…

“The community chose the Utah Mammoth brand.  It stands as a symbol of who we are, where we came from, and the unstoppable force we’re building together,” said team owners Ryan and Ashley Smith.

Believe it or not, archeologists believe that mammoths once roamed across Utah 10,000 years ago. 

Fossils of the Huntington Mammoth were discovered in 1988 in central Utah.

The proposed nickname of Utah Yeti failed to get past a copyright issue with the Yeti cooler and drinkware manufacturer of the same name.

Too bad! 

The Yeti would have been a terrific nickname for this pro hockey team.

Utah has struggled to find good nicknames for its professional sports teams

Anyone who followed sports in Louisiana knows that one of the greatest sports nicknames was the NBA’s New Orleans Jazz.  The Crescent City’s jazz musicians are a big favorite with tourists.

The New Orleans Jazz were an NBA expansion franchise which started playing in 1974.  The team later acquired the Pelican state’s greatest basketball player, Pete Maravich.

The New Orleans Jazz failed financially as the Louisiana Superdome’s initial configuration was too cavernous to watch basketball.  The Superdome’s rental costs worked against the pro basketball team, too.

The team owner moved the New Orleans NBA franchise to Salt Lake City in 1979.  The former Utah Stars of the ABA had exceptional fan support during its 6-year run in Salt Lake City in the early 1970’s.

Instead of changing the nickname, the team became known as the Utah Jazz. 

This was initially done because there wasn’t enough time left prior to the start of the 1979 basketball season for the NBA to effectuate a name change.

Salt Lake City was not and still isn’t known for its jazz entertainment.  The local fans didn’t mind the name, so the Utah Jazz is still playing NBA basketball in Salt Lake City in 2025.

Louisiana fans still chuckle knowing that the Utah Jazz have never won an NBA title.  Then again, the current New Orleans Pelicans franchise hasn’t won a championship, either!

Other Salt Lake City sports nicknames

Other than the poorly named Utah Jazz of the NBA, Salt Lake City is the host for a variety of professional sports franchises.

Some of their nicknames are better than others.

Utah Bees – Salt Lake City’s professional baseball franchise plays in the Class AAA Pacific Coast League. 

A Mormon settlement named Deseret means Honey Bee, and the state of Utah is known as the Beehive State.  Perfect name!

Utah Archers – This unique nickname belongs to Salt Lake City’s professional field lacrosse team which competes in the Premier LaCrosse League.

Utah Grizzlies – The city’s minor league hockey (ECHL) team has been playing since 1988. 

The Grizzlies continued to play this year and competed with the NHL’s Utah Hockey Club for local hockey fans.

Some NHL team nicknames are a little unusual

The Utah Mammoth (ugh) won’t be the only odd nickname for a National Hockey League franchise.

The Mighty Ducks – The Anaheim NHL expansion team was named The Mighty Ducks in 1992.  That nickname was based on a Disney movie of the same name. The team was sold to new owners who shortened the nickname to just “Ducks” in 2006.

Sabres – An NHL expansion franchise in Buffalo chose “Sabres” for its nickname beginning in 1970.  It was better than the team’s three other finalists.  The Buffalo Mugwumps, Buffalo Buzzing Bees, and Buffalo Flying Zeppelins were (thankfully) discarded.

Flames – This pro hockey team was founded in Atlanta in 1971 as the Atlanta Flames.  That nickname made sense since Atlanta was burned down during the Civil War.  The team moved to Calgary in 1980, and the owner kept the nickname anyway.

Blue Jackets – Did you know that the city of Columbus, Ohio produced the majority of the blue coats worn by Union soldiers during the Civil War?

North Stars – This team’s first NHL home was in Minnesota and nicknamed the North Stars.  The team then moved to Dallas in 1993 and smartly dropped the word “North” to reflect the Lone “Star” state of Texas!

Red Wings – Detroit’s NHL franchise started using this odd name in 1932.  It is not named for the shoe company, though. 

Originally known as the Falcons, the nickname was changed by the owner to sound similar to his other pro hockey franchise in Montreal known as the Winged Wheelers.

The Wild – After losing their first NHL team to Dallas, another franchise was awarded to Minneapolis in 2000.  As weak as “The Wild” sounds, it beat other finalists such as the Blue Ox, Freeze, Northern Lights, and White Bears.

Canucks – This 1970 NHL expansion franchise in Vancouver, British Columbia took a name which Canadians have loved since the 1860’s.  A political cartoon named “Johnny Canuck” became a beloved nickname for the word “Canadian”. 

Since Montreal’s NHL team was already named the Canadians, Vancouver went with the Canucks.

Jets – This wandering franchise started in Atlanta, moved to Phoenix, and then landed in Winnipeg in 2011.  The team almost became known as the Manitoba Moose. 

Winnipeg hosted a World Hockey League team decades ago which went by the nickname “Jets”, because the team’s owner was a big fan of the NFL’s New York Jets.

Is this a Mammoth mistake or a terrific marketing idea?

The names Utah and Mammoth don’t really sound like they mix very well – at least to this Southerner from the Bayou State.

I have a mental picture of the team’s in-stadium mascot looking a lot like Mr. Snuffleupagus from Sesame Street.

Having a nickname like Mammoth also conjures up a lumbering, slow moving beast.  Hockey is a very fast paced game, so the Utah Mammoth better get to work on his cardio before the first puck drops in the fall.

This year’s 2024/2025 Utah Hockey Club finished with a respectable record of 38-31 plus 13 overtime losses.  They failed to make the NHL playoffs this spring.

Salt Lake City will start its new NHL season in October featuring the debut of the Utah Mammoth.

Maybe Big Bird will be on hand to drop the opening puck!

The post Another Mammoth nickname mistake for Utah? appeared first on SwampSwamiSports.com.

This weekend featured news reports about several legendary people. 

Some were about sports personalities.  Another featured a man who became the smartest “average guy” investor in US history.

San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich retires after 29 seasons

The San Antonio Spurs were one of four current NBA franchises which began as part of the American Basketball Association.  The Spurs, Indiana Pacers, Denver Nuggets, and Brooklyn (formerly New York) Nets were the only four ABA teams to be invited to join the NBA in 1976.

The head coach of that basketball franchise for the past 29 years from 1996 through this season has been Gregg Popovich.

His route to becoming a professional basketball coach was a very unique journey.

Gregg Popovich was a guard on the college basketball team at the US Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs.  His 1970 undergraduate degree came in Soviet studies.

His Air Force service upon graduation included a lengthy stint playing for the US Armed Forces basketball team in eastern Europe and, of course, Russia.

Popovich gave serious thought about a possible career working for the CIA.  However, he returned to the US in 1973 and became an assistant basketball coach at the Air Force Academy.

He became friends with another basketball coaching legend named Larry Brown.

Gregg Popovich joined the University of Kansas staff to learn more from his mentor.  The two coaches would move into the NBA together with the San Antonio Spurs.

Gregg Popovich became the Spurs’ General Manager and VP of Operations in 1996. 

Drafting 7’1 inch center David Robinson in his first season began the Spurs ascension into becoming one the NBA’s elite teams over the next twenty seasons.

The San Antonio Spurs added 6’11” Wake Forest power forward Tim Duncan the following season in 1997 to create a “twin towers” offense and defense.

The Spurs won the first of their five NBA championships in 1999.

The Gregg Popovich-coached Spurs added four more NBA titles in 2003, 2005, 2007, and 2014. His teams were best known for sharing the basketball to get the ball to open teammates with a closer shot at the basket.

The Spurs’ unselfish play was quite refreshing to watch during a time when most NBA teams featured one or two “stars” dominating the scoring.

The San Antonio Spurs primary stars eventually retired, and Coach Pop’s teams began to fade in the standings during recent years.

The now-76 year old coach suffered a stroke in November, 2024 and was unable to return to the sidelines again this season.

He announced his coaching retirement last week.

Coach Popovich established an NBA record 1,422 wins during his 29 seasons as the head coach of the San Antonio Spurs.  He plans to remain on the staff as the team’s President of Basketball Operations beginning this fall.

Golf pioneer Jim Dent passes away at age 85

The PGA Tour has featured hundreds of professional golfers come and go during my lifetime.  Unfortunately, the number of top black golfers on the PGA Tour could be counted on two hands.

Jim Dent was born in one of America’s most famous golf cities – Augusta, Georgia. He became a golf caddie as a youth.  At 15, Dent started toting the golf bag for professional golfers at the home of The Masters – Augusta National Golf Club.

Dent really loved golf.  Like many of us, he lacked the financial resources to play very much.

The 6’3” 225 pound Jim Dent was an all-around high school athlete who earned a football scholarship to play at Augusta’s Paine College.

Jim Dent dropped out of college after one year to become the caddie for Ladies Professional Golf Association star Patty Berg.

In his spare time, Jim Dent worked hard on his own golf game and was determined to find a way to make it onto the men’s professional golf tour.

The 31-year old Jim Dent finally won a spot on the PGA Tour in 1971 after two unsuccessful attempts at the annual qualifying tournament in Florida.

The 6’3” Dent became known as “Big Jim” for obvious reasons.  He towered over most other pro golfers and became a fan favorite for his long driving skills off the tee.

Dent played 16 years on the PGA Tour but failed to win an official event.  He posted 25 Top-10 finishes and was a top money earner in most of his PGA seasons.

The Senior PGA Tour (now called the PGA Champions Tour) welcomed Jim Dent as he turned 50.  Dent won “rookie” of the year in 1990 and posted four wins in his first two seasons on the senior circuit.

Jim Dent would collect a total of 12 wins over ten seasons playing on the senior tour.

He returned to Augusta National Country Club in April of this year to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Lee Elder becoming the first black golfer to compete in The Masters.

Jim Dent died on May 2nd after suffering a second stroke in the past year.  He was 85.

Warren Buffett hangs up his money belt at Berkshire Hathaway

Legendary investment guru Warren Buffett started Berkshire Hathaway 60 years ago on a shoestring budget along with his partner, Charlie Munger.

The two pioneer investors slowly built a company worth more than $1 Trillion today.

Charlie Munger died in 2023 at age 99.  Warren Buffett has continued on as the CEO of this Omaha, Nebraska-based company.

Berkshire Hathaway owns brand names like Geico Insurance, Dairy Queen, Benjamin Moore Paints, Fruit-of-the-Loom, Pilot Flying J Truck stops, MidAmerican Energy, and Burlington, Northern, and Santa Fe (BNSF) Railroad among others.

Warren Buffett’s personal favorite acquisition may have been See’s Candies in 1972.  That $25 million investment is now worth more than $2 billion.

Sweet!

Berkshire Hathaway has acquired a significant stock position in major corporations such as Coca Cola, American Express, Apple, and Conoco Phillips.

On Saturday, the now 94-year old Warren Buffett surprised thousands of guests at Berkshire Hathaway’s annual stockholders meeting in Omaha by announcing his retirement as CEO at the end of 2025.

The event is called “The Woodstock of Capitalism”.  It features tens of thousands of visitors who come to Nebraska every year to celebrate the company’s success and hear Warren Buffett’s annual speech to shareholders.

Warren Buffett and pop singer Jimmy Buffett shared the same last name but were not related.

The singer jokingly referred to Warren as his “Uncle Warren” while the billionaire loved listening to his “Cousin Jimmy” prior to Jimmy Buffett’s passing in 2024.

“Uncle Warren” still lives in the same house that he and his wife purchased in Omaha back in 1958.  His frugal lifestyle matches the prudent and common sense investment style which slowly turned into a financial empire.

Buffett plans to donate 99% of his estimated $160 billion in personal wealth to charities.

The remaining 1% of Warren Buffett’s net worth ($1.6 billion) will go to his three “kids” (now in their 60’s) and others.

The LSU-Shreveport baseball team streak has reached 51 games in a row!

Talk about a legendary winning streak!

The 51-0 LSU-Shreveport Pilots baseball team is still undefeated in the year 2025.  The team will now host an opening round of the NAIA national baseball tournament beginning May 12.

The unbeaten Pilots survived a close call (a 9-7 victory over Our Lady of the Lake University from San Antonio) last weekend.

LSU-S went 4-0 to sweep the Red River Athletics Conference (RRAC) baseball tournament last weekend in Sterlington, Louisiana just north of Monroe.

This incredible winning streak has eclipsed the longest winning streak record for every NCAA Division (1, II, and III) along with the NAIA’s former top mark of 44 games.

The LSU-S Pilots’ primary goal is to win the school’s first national baseball championship at the NAIA Baseball World Series in Lewiston, Idaho. 

That event will begin on May 23.

Congratulations to LSU-Shreveport (one of my alma maters) for setting a national record which may stand for many years to come.

Legendary, indeed!  Geaux Pilots! 

The post Legendary Memories appeared first on SwampSwamiSports.com.

The National Basketball Association plays an exhaustive 82-game regular season from October through April.

Most NBA regular season games are played with the intensity of a friendly intrasquad scrimmage.  The players seem bored much of the time and more focused on building their personal statistics during the lengthy regular season.

About the only time you might observe any significant defensive effort being displayed during a regular season comes halfway through the fourth quarter during a relatively close basketball game.

The top four scoring teams in this year’s NBA regular season (Cleveland, Memphis, Denver, and Oklahoma City) all averaged more than 120 points per game.  Just a couple of weeks into the NBA playoffs, only Cleveland and OKC still are scoring 120 points or more per game.

The NBA’s top defensive team in the regular season (Orlando) allowed 105 points per outing.  Six of the 16 NBA playoff teams are allowing less than 105 points per game in the early round of the 2025 post-season.

The NBA playoffs bring out the fight in many teams

There were 16 (out of 30) NBA teams which qualified for the playoffs in April.

Fans have observed their favorite basketball team turning up the defensive intensity – much like those classic cartoon showdowns between Bugs Bunny vs. Yosemite Sam.

I watched the normally docile Houston Rockets get into two different physical altercations within 15 minutes on Monday night in their best-of-seven playoff series against the Golden State Warriors.

Golden State’s designated heel, Draymond Green, was involved in both of those pushing and shoving matches.

A total of four technical fouls were doled out in those two angry outbursts by the two teams. Green also picked up a flagrant foul along with his “T”.

The Warriors lead the series with Houston 3-2 after the Rockets finally discovered their offense on Wednesday night in Houston in a 131-116 victory.

The series moves back to San Francisco on Friday night for Game 6.

The Warriors’ All-Star shooting guard Stephen Curry is being hacked by Houston defenders as soon as the ball is released from his shooting hand.

Curry’s thumb on his shooting hand was injured a few months ago and has not fully healed.

Houston Rockets defenders are quite aware that NBA referees will not call a foul if the shooter’s arm is hit after the basketball has been released by Steph Curry.

The referees say that the current rules allow this unnecessary extra contact.  The Rockets defenders (unofficially, of course) will continue to hack away at one of the NBA’s top stars.

Golden State head coach Steve Kerr (a former NBA player with Michael Jordan’s Chicago Bulls teams) said that this officiating decision is “the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.”

Why don’t NBA referees call fouls consistently during the regular season and playoffs?

The answer usually involves something akin to “We want the players to decide the games.”

My translation is “Fewer people will watch NBA games on television if the star players are sitting on the bench in foul trouble before halftime.”

Whether in high school, college, or pro basketball, fouls should be called consistently.

Officials in every sport must be consistent to avoid any appearance of favoring one team over another.

Basketball players quickly notice how closely a game is being called by the referees in the opening minutes.  Players will increase or decrease the level of pushing, shoving, and excessive physicality upon noticing how closely the referees call fouls in the opening minutes.

The NBA doesn’t want its top players like Steph Curry or Jason Tatum of the Boston Celtics sitting on the bench with four fouls before halftime.

Remember that the NBA pays the salaries of the officials.  The NBA could easily cut down on the increased physicality during its playoff games simply by calling fouls by the book.

NBA referees shoulder much of the blame for the increasing number of on-court outbursts during the playoff season.

The refs understand that their employer (the league’s management) wants the biggest stars to remain on the court.

That means that NBA players and their coaches know they can get away with more unnecessary roughness during the playoffs.  And they do.

NBA East – Boston and Cleveland may be on a collision course

Last June, the NBA’s championship round featured the popular Boston Celtics winning their first title since 2008.

This year’s #2 Eastern Conference seed Boston Celtics just completed a 3-1 series victory over a very physical #7 seed Orlando Magic.

Next up for the C’s will be the winner of the New York Knicks vs. Detroit Pistons match-up.  New York leads that series 3-2 heading into Thursday night’s Game 6 in Detroit.

The 2025 regular season NBA Eastern Conference winner was…are you ready…the Cleveland Cavaliers.

The top seeded Cavaliers steamrolled their way to the Eastern Conference title with an impressive regular season record of 64-18.

The #1 Cavs completely demolished #8 East seed Miami Heat in the opening round of the NBA playoffs this week.  They set an NBA record victory point margin of 122 points (40.5 points per game) and sent a big message to future opponents that Cleveland’s regular season was not a fluke.

Next up for Cleveland is a Saturday opening game against the #4 seed Indiana Pacers in Round 2.  The Pacers polished-off Milwaukee 4-1 earlier this week.

NBA West – A Round 1 “B’bye” to LeBron, Luka, and the Lakers

The 40-year old LeBron James is still playing basketball at a high level.  He is starting to show his age playing against much younger stars who are quicker and able to block his shots with ease.

The #3 Western Conference seed Los Angeles Lakers added high scoring former Dallas Mavericks star Luka Doncic a few months ago in the biggest trade in recent NBA history.  Luka’s conditioning and lingering injury status will continue to be a story line heading into next fall.

His new team was just shown the door – at home – in Round 1 of the NBA playoffs.

The #6 seed Minnesota Timberwolves ended the Lakers’ season on Wednesday with a sloppy 103-96 win in Los Angeles.

The T-wolves connected on just seven of their 47 3-point shots (15%) for the game – on the road – and still won.

Minnesota outrebounded the Lakers 54-37 and easily converted a number of shots near the basket.   The Timberwolves now move ahead into Round 2 to face the winner of the Golden State vs. Houston series.

The #1 West seed Oklahoma City Thunder easily dispatched #8 Memphis in four straight games. 

OKC posted the best regular season record in the NBA this season (68-14).

That’s an impressive 83% winning percentage.

Oklahoma City is getting some rest and will play the winner of the #4 Denver Nuggets and #5 Los Angeles Clippers series. Denver leads 3-2 with Game 6 to be played tonight in Los Angeles.

ABC fears a Cleveland vs. Oklahoma City NBA Finals match-up

Television ratings for the NBA Finals usually tank when there isn’t at least one major market East Coast or West Coast pro basketball team involved.

A June match-up of the NBA’s two regular season conference champions would cause panic at ABC.

Cleveland plays in the #17 ranked television market.  OKC operates in TV market #45.

You can be sure that the network brass will be rooting for the NBA’s defending champion Boston Celtics (TV market #7) to oust Cleveland in the Eastern Conference finals in a few weeks.

In the Western Conference, the television executives will be quietly pulling for the winner of the Los Angeles Clippers (#2 TV market) to rally and win their series over the #15 TV market Denver Nuggets.

The popular Golden State Warriors (#6 TV market) would show nicely to a national television audience if they are able to dispatch the Houston Rockets (#10 TV market and lacking a major star) on Friday night.

The Minnesota Timberwolves (#15 TV market) await the winner of that series.

OKC and Cleveland opened the playoffs with 4-0 sweeps of their respective first round opponents.

The odds continue to move in favor of the Thunder and Cavs playing in the NBA Finals beginning on June 5.

The biggest Boston Celtics and Golden State Warriors fans in America during the month of May will be the advertising sales department at ABC.

The post NBA Playoff teams are Kung Fu Fighting appeared first on SwampSwamiSports.com.

How do you think it might have felt being named Jack Nicklaus, Jr.?

Jack Nicklaus, Jr. (who goes by the name Jackie) was born in 1961 and is the first son of the greatest golfer of all time. 

His father, Jack Nicklaus, dominated professional golf for the first 25 years of young Jackie Nicklaus’ life.

Can you imagine how many times per day the young blond-haired Jack Nicklaus, Jr. was asked if he played golf just like his Dad?   He was proud of his famous father, but young Jackie Nicklaus was placed under a golf microscope whether he wanted it or not.

Jackie Nicklaus became good enough at golf to earn a scholarship to play for the University of North Carolina.  He also tried his hand at professional golf – just like his famous father.

After working through the qualifying tours, Jack Nicklaus, Jr. eventually reached the PGA Tour.  He then missed an incredible 24 straight cuts on the same professional golf tour which his father once dominated.   

The younger Nicklaus never earned a dime playing professional golf on the world’s biggest tour.

Jackie Nicklaus opted to change careers and became a very successful golf course designer for his father’s company, Nicklaus Design.

What does this have to do with Deion Sanders?

How do you think it might feel being a son of NFL Hall-of-Famer Deion Sanders?

Deion Sanders was a college phenom at Florida State. 

Sanders excelled as a defensive back for the Seminoles football team, played center field for the baseball team, and even ran on the 4 x 100 relay team during Florida State’s track season.

Deion Sanders then played professional baseball and pro football – at the same time!

He was drafted by baseball’s New York Yankees and the NFL’s Atlanta Falcons in 1989.

Sanders’ professional football and baseball contracts allowed him to play both sports during the same calendar year. 

He would start playing baseball in the spring, leave for the NFL during early August, and return to play baseball in late September if his team qualified for the playoffs.

Deion picked up the nickname “Prime Time” by a high school basketball teammate after Sanders scored 37 points during a road victory.

While still playing professional sports, Deion Sanders’ interest in rap music led him to release a 1994 album titled (what else) “Prime Time”.

His over-the-top level of personal confidence and penchant for wearing flashy jewelry in college and professional sports helped to create a persona which sports fans learned to either love or loathe.

Like father, like sons?

Deion Sanders retired from the NFL in 2001.  He worked as a television analyst for CBS Sports and the NFL Network.

After his pro sports career ended, Sanders was able to spend more time helping to raise five children (two daughters and three sons) from his two marriages.

His first son (born from marriage #1) is named Deion Sanders, Jr.

Deion, Jr. played football well enough to land a scholarship at SMU in Dallas.

The young man eventually moved into fashion design after college and has produced a few rap albums, too.

Daddy Deion’s second marriage produced two more sons – Shilo and Shedeur Sanders.

Their high profile father became an assistant coach for his two sons’ high school football team in suburban Dallas.

Having a world-famous father named Deion Sanders coaching your high school football team brought a lot of attention to Shilo (a defensive back like his father) and Shedeur (a quarterback).

Shilo played well enough to earn a football scholarship to the University of South Carolina. 

His younger brother, Shedeur, developed into a top rated high school quarterback.

Deion Sanders interviewed for and was hired as the new head football coach at Jackson State University in 2020.  Both sons (Shedeur and Shilo) came along as a package deal beginning in 2021.

The Deion Sanders-led Jackson State Tigers won 11 games in 2021 and established a school record with 12 victories in 2022.

Coach Deion Sanders surprised the college football world by accepting the top football job at the University of Colorado beginning in 2023. 

Of course, his two talented sons transferred to CU to play for their famous father for their final two years of college eligibility.

The NCAA’s Name, Image, and Likeness rules allowed both Shilo and Shedeur to financially benefit from living in the incredible media spotlight at the University of Colorado.

Quarterback Shedeur Sanders’ NIL endorsement value was estimated at more than $5 million by the end of his first year with the Buffaloes.

To put that in perspective, the young quarterback’s net worth was higher than the 2024 NFL salary for a middle-of-the-first round draft choice.

The Colorado Buffaloes improved from 1-13 two years ago to a sterling 9-4 record and a college bowl game last season after just two years in Boulder.

Coach Deion Sanders was rewarded with a 5-year $54 million contract extension signed a few months ago.

The Sanders’ family balloon bursts at last weekend’s 2025 NFL draft

Quarterback Shedeur Sanders’ ego grew exponentially after his increasing media fame at both Jackson State and Colorado.

Playing football for your famous father both in high school and college made him one of the rarest players on the planet.

Shedeur Sanders has been coached using the same offensive scheme in high school and through all four years of college.  NFL teams likely had concerns about young Sanders’ ability to successfully adapt to a different type of offensive system.

Some pro football scouts think Shedeur’s success as a quarterback at Colorado had been greatly assisted by having the Heisman Trophy winning (and 2nd overall NFL draft selection) Travis Hunter as the team’s primary wide receiver.

The media hype about Colorado’s turnaround story drove the Sanders’ family narrative, too.  The team was prominently featured in numerous nationally televised games in both 2023 and 2024.

The television ratings for those games were winners, too.

Coach Deion Sanders’ wide open offense allowed quarterback Shedeur Sanders to improvise quite a bit. 

He made a number of spectacular downfield throws to speedy Travis Hunter over the past two seasons.

Colorado’s 9-4 record in 2024 should also be attributed to a significant improvement in the Buffs’ defense, too.

All the while, quarterback Shedeur Sanders was being talked-up by his father/coach as a top NFL quarterback prospect worthy of being an early first round draft pick in 2025.

Shedeur Sanders posted a terrific 2024 season at Colorado and was named the Big 12 Conference offensive player of the year.  Those post-season accolades may have served to further inflate the young quarterback’s ego leading into this spring’s NFL draft.

The young NIL marketer started his own “Legendary” brand featuring Shedeur’s personal logo – a large dollar sign to the 2nd power (his football jersey number was #2).

Shedeur Sanders feels “special” and wasn’t shy letting NFL folks know about his own perceived worth.

Unsurprisingly, several NFL teams said that Shedeur Sanders performed very poorly during interviews conducted in the weeks leading up to last weekend’s draft.

The general consensus was that Sanders’ massive ego along with his overbearing father would quickly become a locker room concern for the NFL team which selected him/them.

Shedeur Sanders fell into the 5th round of the NFL draft on Saturday

ESPN’s long-time draft analyst Mel Kiper, Jr. (who never played college football) touted Shedeur Sanders as a very likely first round selection.  With 32 NFL teams selecting in each round, 143 selections were made before Shedeur Sanders’ name was called by the Cleveland Browns as #144 during the fifth round on Saturday.

In the 3rd round of this same draft, Cleveland had already selected University of Oregon quarterback Dillon Gabriel.

Sanders had just become the fifth quarterback on the Cleveland Browns roster.  Most NFL teams only carry three quarterbacks into the regular season.

Cleveland Browns General Manager Andrew Berry said that selecting a second quarterback in the fifth round of the draft was primarily motivated by Shedeur Sanders’ falling price tag.

“Once it got to the point where it felt like it was a pretty steep discount, we just felt like this made the most sense”, said Berry over the weekend.

Mel Kiper literally melted down on the ESPN set Saturday afternoon after Shedeur Sanders became the 144th overall selection in the 2025 NFL draft.

The four commentators went back and forth for nearly 15 minutes as Kiper was flabbergasted that Shedeur Sanders had been passed by all 32 NFL teams in the four preceding rounds.

The draft demotion to the fifth round will cost Shedeur Sanders millions of dollars, too.  Last season, NFL fifth round picks earned an average signing bonus of $360,000 with a total four-year compensation valued at $4.2 million.

Remember, Shedeur Sanders earned more as a college football player at Colorado with his massive NIL deals.  Sanders cannot return to college football after exhausting his fourth year of eligibility last season.

Let’s assume that Shedeur Sanders does become a quality NFL starter during his initial four-year contract.  He could still earn hundreds of millions during his next two NFL contracts.

What happened to his brother, Shilo Sanders?

Older brother Shilo Sanders was not selected during this weekend’s NFL seven round draft.

Interestingly, Shilo dumped his father Deion Sanders as his primary representative and hired highly regarded NFL agent Drew Rosenhaus to help him find a pro football job.

The defensive back was quickly signed to a free agent contract by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers with a guarantee of $50,000 whether he makes the team or not.

Any player who makes the final NFL roster in early September will earn no less than the NFL’s 2025 minimum pay of $840,000.

Is it fair to compare the Sanders’ family situation to the family of Archie Manning?

No.

Former New Orleans Saints quarterback Archie Manning was never as talented or famous as Deion Sanders.

He spent much of his pro football career running for his life behind a horrible Saints’ offensive line during the early years of the Crescent City’s expansion NFL franchise.

Archie Manning never coached his two famous quarterback sons (Peyton and Eli) in high school or college.  Papa Manning was not voted into the NFL Hall-of-Fame, either.

Peyton Manning went to college at the University of Tennessee.  His younger brother, Eli, followed in Dad’s footsteps at Ole Miss.

After Peyton Manning was selected #1 overall in the 1998 NFL draft to Indianapolis, brother Eli’s turn arrived six years later in 2004.

The San Diego Chargers drafted Eli Manning with the #1 overall pick (though he was quickly traded to the New York Giants – at his request – days later).

Peyton Manning won two Super Bowl games and was elected to the NFL Hall-of-Fame.  Eli also won two Super Bowl games but failed to make the Hall-of-Fame Class of 2025 during his first year of eligibility.

Neither of Deion Sanders’ youngest two sons were drafted #1 overall this year.  One or both of those young men may go on to have a very successful and profitable professional football career.

We must wait for a few decades to see whether quarterback Shedeur Sanders or defensive back Shilo Sanders will perform well enough to receive a nomination to become part of a future NFL Hall-of-Fame class and join their famous father.

The messy outcome of this weekend’s NFL Draft should serve as an exceptional teaching moment for some overly-proud fathers and their talented sons.

The post Well intended Daddy Deion created this Mess appeared first on SwampSwamiSports.com.

Green Bay, Wisconsin has less than 110,000 residents.  The NFL’s smallest market will more than double in size as the city hosts the 2025 NFL Draft beginning Thursday (Round 1) and continuing Friday (Rounds 2 and 3) and into Saturday (Rounds 4, 5, 6, and 7).

The weather forecast for this week’s NFL Draft in Green Bay is, well, very much like you might expect in late April.  Fans braving the elements will find very chilly temperatures (low 40’s) with cold rain expected both Thursday night and much of the day on Friday.

That would be ideal weather for ducks, but the NFL still expects upwards of 250,000 fans to attend this three-day event in Green Bay.

The primary stage for the NFL draft will be located just outside of Green Bay’s famous Lambeau Field football stadium.

Green Bay Packers fans call themselves “Cheeseheads” to honor Wisconsin’s dairy industry.

Despite the dreary weather forecast for this week’s NFL Draft, plentiful adult beverages plus numerous polka bands, cheese carving demonstrations, and more Wisconsin fun await the brave fans attending this year’s NFL Draft beginning Thursday evening.

The city of Green Bay expects more than $100 million in economic benefits to be realized from this weekend’s football extravaganza.

I expect umbrella, poncho, and hot chocolate vendors to exceed their original sales forecasts.

NFL Draft – a brief history

The annual NFL player draft began 89 years ago!

NFL owners established a nine round draft back in 1936.  The previous year’s worst teams were given the highest pick of former college football players in each round of the draft.

Heisman Trophy winning halfback Jay Berwanger from the University of Chicago was the first NFL draft selection by the Philadelphia Eagles in February, 1936.

The number of draft rounds has bounced around over the years.  The NFL draft grew to ten rounds in 1937 and then ballooned to 20 in 1939.

By 1970, Louisiana Tech quarterback Terry Bradshaw was taken by the Pittsburgh Steelers with the #1 overall pick in a draft which still had 17 rounds.

The NFL draft has been reduced to just seven rounds in recent years.  That increases the amount of undrafted players who are now able to negotiate a free agent contract with any team for a possible training camp roster spot.

Your favorite NFL team’s biggest chance of making a first round draft blunder comes when selecting a defensive lineman, running back, or wide receiver.  Just 58% of those first round picks become starters for more than half of their future NFL careers.

The greatest first round draft success comes when selecting offensive linemen (83%), linebackers (70%) and tight ends (68%).

In case you were wondering, first round quarterbacks have a 63% chance of starting for more than half of their NFL careers.

Speaking of quarterbacks…

The 2025 NFL draft will not see a large number of quarterbacks selected in the first round.  Last year’s first round saw a record-tying six QB’s taken by desperate NFL teams.

Confidence is low that any of this year’s crop of college quarterbacks will end-up in the NFL Hall of Fame once their careers end.

Thursday night’s first quarterback expected to be drafted is Cam Ward from the University of Miami (Fl).  A true professional at utilizing the NCAA’s transfer portal, Ward played for three different universities (Incarnate Word, Washington State, and the University of Miami) during his four years in college.

Shedeur Sanders of Colorado and Jaxson Dart of Ole Miss are hoping to hear their names called in the first round Thursday night.  Sanders hasn’t fared well in the interview room before the draft and may fall down the draft board to either the quarterback-needy New Orleans Saints (at #9) or Pittsburgh Steelers (#21).

Neither Sanders nor Dart are considered “can’t miss” prospect by most football analysts.

Other quarterbacks expected to be selected (most likely on Friday in Rounds 2 and 3) include Alabama’s Jalen Milroe, Quinn Ewers of Texas, Oregon’s Dillon Gabriel and Ohio State starter Will Howard.

Will there be three running backs taken in the first round this year?

Recent years have seen most of the top running backs fall into the second and third rounds of the NFL draft.  Being overused in high school and college can wear down the knees and legs of many elite running backs.

At least two running backs are expected to have their names called in Thursday night’s first round of the NFL draft.

Ashton Jeanty of Boise State was the Heisman Trophy runner-up last season.  He led the Boise State Broncos into the initial 12-team College Football Playoffs after the team posted a 12-1 record.

Jeanty’s ability to avoid being tackled by the first defender has earned the praise of NFL scouts.  He is expected to be selected in the first five picks of Round #1 Thursday.

North Carolina running back Omarion Hampton combines size and athletic ability to become a likely mid-first round selection Thursday night.  The Dallas Cowboys could use this running back who excels at catching the ball out of the backfield and eluding tacklers.

Ohio State’s TreVeyon Henderson is a potential third running back who may selected late in the first round.  Henderson is more of a straightforward style of runner who also has done well at catching the football as he circles out of the backfield.

What will Jerry Jones and the Dallas Cowboys do?

The Dallas Cowboys fell back to a 7-10 record in 2024 as the team’s quarterback (Dak Prescott) and other key players suffered serious injuries.

Owner Jerry Jones is talking to the media again (uh-oh) and vowing to make some major deals very soon.  What does that mean, though?

One source indicated that Pittsburgh Steelers’ moody wide receiver George Pickens may be coming to Dallas soon.

Last year, the 81-year old Dallas Cowboys owner promised the media that he was going “All in”.  Cowboys fans remember how well that worked out for the team in 2024.

The Cowboys could use a starting running back plus another top level wide receiver to add a little “giddy-up” to the team’s offense.

Dallas fans have learned to temper their expectations when Jerry Jones pulls the strings.

Should the New Orleans Saints select a first round quarterback or address their other needs?

To say that highly paid ($40 million/year) quarterback Derek Carr has been a bust in New Orleans is being kind.

Following future Hall-of-Famer Drew Brees wasn’t expected to be easy.  Derek Carr’s lackluster performance has made some Saints fans wish that the now 46-year old Brees might consider a return.

Carr is entering his 12th NFL season and has still only played (and lost) in one playoff game during his career.

Saints fans recently learned that Derek Carr has a mysterious shoulder injury which might keep him sidelined for the entire 2025 NFL season.

What if Colorado quarterback Shedeur Sanders and Ole Miss QB Jaxson Dart are both available when the Saints select at #9 in the first round of Thursday’s NFL draft?

The Saints are coming off a pitiful 5-12 season and have a myriad of needs.  The team was likely focusing on selecting a wide receiver or getting help for the aging defensive line prior to learning that their veteran quarterback might miss the entire season.

The Saints may not be sold on either Shedeur Sanders or Jaxson Dart as the team’s future quarterback.

If they still desire one of those two quarterbacks, the Saints should try to trade down a few notches and, hopefully, add another mid-round selection to address other needs.

Better yet, a “value” quarterback should be available in Rounds 3 or 4 for the Saints to bring into training camp to compete for the starting job this fall.

Stick with your original game plan for this year’s NFL draft, Saints!

Houston Texans’ wish list includes a running back and some offensive linemen

The AFC South’s Houston Texans are coming off another playoff season at 10-7.

Adding a quality starting running back, a top-level tight end, and upgrading the offensive line will be the Texans’ focus in this week’s NFL draft.

Houston scored less than 22 points per game in 2024 (good for 19th out of 32 NFL teams).  Even the Pittsburgh Steelers averaged more points last fall than the Houston Texans.

This team has a lot of momentum heading into 2025 and will again benefit from playing in one of the weakest divisions in the league.  Houston’s AFC South competition includes Tennessee (3-14 last year), Jacksonville (4-13 in 2024) and the Indianapolis Colts (8-9 last season).

The Texans have rapidly improved after making the very smart move of trading former starting quarterback Deshaun Watson to the Cleveland Browns.  They have utilized the draft choices from Cleveland wisely to quickly rebuild this team.

Third year head coach DeMeco Ryans (a former Texans linebacker) has done a fabulous job in transforming Houston into a legitimate AFC title contender.

Final draft thoughts…

ESPN wants fans to be tense entering Thursday night’s 7PM CDT first round of the NFL draft.  It’s good for their ratings!

Football fans get to pretend to be their favorite NFL team’s owner or General Manager for three days.

We will cheer or boo many selections.

Just don’t become too upset when your team makes a boneheaded pick.

Most of the players being selected this week are unlikely to have an immediate impact on the fortunes of your favorite team this fall.

Get your popcorn ready and have a rollicking good time!

The post The Cheesehead NFL Draft begins Thursday appeared first on SwampSwamiSports.com.

The wrestling term “kayfabe” means that you are willing to set aside your common sense and play along with the story line.  That term is familiar to professional wrestling fans as the characters adopt a certain personality and fans generally go along with it.

It is also much like those who watch television soap operas and feel like the performers are real.

Perhaps you remember the villainous Stefano DiMera on the long-running soap opera “Days of Our Lives”?

Let’s take a look at a few sports stories which may have fans scratching their heads in disbelief this week.

Not Kayfabe – LSU-Shreveport’s baseball team just established a new NAIA record with 44 wins in a row

The #1 ranked LSU-Shreveport Pilots wrapped up a three-game sweep over nationally ranked University of Houston-Victoria (34-12) last weekend to run their 2025 season record to an amazing 44-0.

The weekend sweep also gave LSU-S the NAIA national record for most consecutive wins in a baseball season.

Speaking of records, the NCAA’s Division 1 major college mark is 34 straight wins by the Texas Longhorns (1977) and later tied by Florida Atlantic in 1999.

NCAA Division III’s Trinity College (Connecticut) still holds the D-III record at 44 straight wins from the year 2008. LSU-S just tied that mark.

Only NCAA Division II’s Savannah State 2000 team (46 consecutive wins) is now ahead of LSU-Shreveport’s incredible winning streak.

LSU-S could finish the regular season with a perfect 47-0 record this weekend if they are able to complete a three-game road sweep against the Jarvis Christian Bulldogs.

Jarvis Christian (located about 20 miles north of Tyler, Texas) is just 5-24 this spring and will be the final team with a chance to prevent the Pilots from completing a perfect regular season of college baseball.

If LSU-S survives the opening rounds of the NAIA playoffs in mid-May, the Pilots may be off to Lewiston, Idaho to compete in their World Series from May 23-31.

“The Streak” will be long remembered at the school.  However, this year’s LSU-Shreveport Pilots baseball team would prefer to bring home the university’s first NAIA national championship next month.

Kayfabe – John Cena turns wrestling heel and wins 17th WWE title belt

WWE wrestling legend John Cena started his career more than two decades ago as a “face” (good guy) and has continued in that role for his lengthy grappling career.

John Cena followed fellow WWE star Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson into the movie business and left the wrestling to the younger stars in recent years.

Apparently, the 47-year old Cena’s cash register stopped ringing in Hollywood.

He decided to mount one final comeback to pick the pockets of his loyal pro wrestling fans during 2025.

John Cena did the unthinkable this spring and turned “heel” (bad guy) for the first time in his lengthy career.

In my opinion, Cena’s acting chops have not delivered a very convincing performance thus far as most fans aren’t buying his new darker persona.

On Sunday night, John Cena (with a little outside interference) defeated Cody Rhodes to grab the WWE title for a record 17th time.  Ric Flair (the 16-time champ) is now 76 years old and (let’s hope) won’t be making one final comeback trying to get his record back.

This new sinister version of John Cena now holds the WWE title.  He was purposefully rude to the press following Sunday night’s victory at the latest WrestleMania event in Las Vegas.

Try as he might, John Cena is simply not very convincing as a heel.  Perhaps that is his new gimmick?

Meanwhile, the exhausted former champion Cody Rhodes is now able to take a well-deserved rest away from this grueling physical faux sport.

It’s only a matter of time before John Cena will come to his senses and return into his true “good guy” mode in the coming months.  I expect Cena’s reign as champ will be relatively short and come to an end prior to the end of 2025.

During that time, Cena will have stuffed enough money into his wrestling boots to finally walk away from WWE even wealthier. 

Wrestling fans want the soon-to-be retired John Cena to morph back into the more likable persona he developed over the past two decades.

Not Kayfabe – Shedeur Sanders’ football number retired by University of Colorado

Coach Deion Sanders arrived at the University of Colorado two years ago and brought two of his talented sons from Jackson State along with him.

Buffaloes’ cornerback Shiloh Sanders played well but is unlikely hear his name called in the NFL Draft coming up later this week.  He still might be signed to an NFL roster after the draft concludes.

Quarterback Shedeur Sanders is projected to be selected at some point during the first round of the NFL Draft on Thursday night.  The New Orleans Saints (with pick #9) and Pittsburgh Steelers (with the 21st selection in Round 1) are possible landing spots for the talented but highly hyped Sanders.

Shedeur Sanders has already become a millionaire in college football by utilizing the Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) gravy train to his personal advantage.  Entering last season, Shedeur Sanders was worth nearly $5 million in the NIL market.

The Sanders trio has helped to turn around the University of Colorado’s football program over the past two seasons.  The Buffs improved from 1-11 in 2023 to post 4-8 and 9-4 records in 2023 and 2024.

That impressive feat is worthy of praise from fans and alumni at Colorado.

But is two years of exceptional play worth retiring the football number of Sheduer Sanders at CU?

Shedeur Sanders’ #2 jersey was officially retired by the Colorado Buffaloes during the team’s annual spring football game last Saturday.  Teammate Travis Hunter (who won the Heisman Trophy in 2024) also had his #12 football number retired by the school.

Though Sanders’ stats were solid, his team posted a measly 13-12 record over his two year stint in Boulder.

Prior to Saturday, the Colorado Buffaloes had retired just four other players’ numbers in the school’s lengthy football history.

Nominations to retire a football number are totally within the purview of the University of Colorado’s athletics department – of which “Daddy” Deion Sanders is the head football coach.

Questionable?  Absolutely. 

The entire ceremony felt like a Kayfabe moment, but it really did happen on Saturday at CU!

Not Kayfabe (but it seems like it) – Tennessee QB jumps to UCLA, while UCLA QB transfers to Tennessee?

Last week, I provided a detailed description about the departure of University of Tennessee quarterback Nico Iamaleava.

In a nutshell, the college quarterback wanted a raise from $2 million last season to $4 million this year. He was dismissed from the team by Tennessee’s head football coach for skipping mandatory practices as he negotiated to be paid more NIL loot.

Over the weekend, we learned that Nico successfully navigated the NCAA’s transfer portal to land at UCLA for the 2025 fall football season.

But wait, there’s more!

A different transfer quarterback (who utilized the portal last winter to come play quarterback for UCLA) is now responding by jumping back into the transfer portal this spring.

He is expected to sign with (yes) the University of Tennessee!

Joey Aguilar was the starting quarterback for Appalachian State University of the Sunbelt Conference in 2024.  Over the winter, he utilized the NCAA transfer portal to go west to UCLA.

Joey Aguilar was expected to become the Bruins’ starting quarterback in 2025.

That was before the Tennessee quarterback Nico Iamaleava showed up last weekend in southern California.

This week’s hot rumor is that Tennessee may pilfer Joey Aguilar away from UCLA before he even plays a down for the Bruins this fall.

This weird quarterback saga is getting stranger by the day as more news surfaces.

The word is out that Nico Iamaleava’s younger brother named Madden is transferring away from the University of Arkansas following his freshman year to join his brother at – you guessed it – UCLA this fall.

For those keeping score at home, that makes three UCLA quarterback signees, but one has already departed for Tennessee.

Tennessee lost a quarterback but just signed one from Appalachian State via UCLA.

Appalachian State and Arkansas have just been stood-up for the fall dance.

Welcome to college football 2025!

It may feel like this odd college football news must be kayfabe, but it isn’t.

The post Kayfabe Sports Highlights appeared first on SwampSwamiSports.com.