(TUCSON, Ariz.) — The Arizona Diamondbacks announced today that they have agreed to terms on a minor league contract with right-handed pitcher Kris Benson, according to D-backs’ Executive Vice President & General Manager Josh Byrnes.
Benson, who will be assigned to the D-backs’ minor league camp, has a 69-74 record and 4.41 ERA in 203 games, including 197 starts, during his eight-year Major League career with the Pittsburgh Pirates, New York Mets, Baltimore Orioles and Texas Rangers. He was the No. 1 overall selection in the 1996 First-Year Player Draft by the Pirates and went 21-26 with a 3.95 ERA from 1999-2000 after making his Major League debut. Benson missed the entire 2001 season after having Tommy John surgery and was later traded to the Mets near the trading deadline in 2004. He compiled a 10-8 mark and 4.13 ERA in 28 starts for the Mets in 2005 and then was traded to the Orioles prior to the 2006 season, when he was 11-12 with a 4.82 ERA in 30 starts.
Benson missed the entire 2007 season after having rotator cuff surgery on his right shoulder. He signed with the Philadelphia Phillies in February 2008 and posted a 1-4 record and 5.52 ERA in 11 starts at Triple-A Lehigh Valley over a two-month period before being granted his release on Aug. 30, 2008. Benson made the Rangers’ 2009 Opening Day roster as one of their starting pitchers, but after a short stint on the disabled list, he was relegated to the bullpen in long relief and was 1-1 with an 8.46 ERA in 8 games, 2 starts, overall.
Thursday night was bad night for Sun Devil fans like me. The loss to Stanford was hard for me to deal with because I just knew that it was going to ruin their NCAA tournament hopes. Sunday came and I got the text message towards the end of my last church meeting that ASU was not selected for an at-large bid. Was I surprised? Not at all. Was I disappointed? Well, what do you think? I’m a Sun Devil. I wanted them to get in and hopefully make a splash. No such luck. Instead, the NIT. Bummer. It was like having a shot at a date with a varsity cheerleader, only to have them all get taken before your shot, so you have to settle with one of the JV girls. Wait a minute…that’s not so bad. You’re still dating a cheerleader! Only in some ways, it’s better for you. You see, you likely would have been out after only one date with one of the varsity girls. With the JV girl, you actually have a chance to have something special with her, something much more than one awkward and disappointing evening.
It would be easy to look at how the season ended as a disappointment, but to do that would deny what the team had to work with. I can compare it to my recent experience with my oldest son’s Cub Scout Pinewood Derby. I will preface this by stating that one of my many lacks of talent includes artistic prowess (drawing/painting) and a steady hand for such things. I did the Pinewood Derby when I was a kid, that last time being when I was nine. My son is now a Cub Scout and, as such, has his first Derby. So you take an under-talented dad like me (the ASU basketball team) and the expectations are low (the Devils were predicted to finish anywhere from seventh place to last place in the PAC-10, and their team leaders included a senior guard that was basically a throw in scholarship in Derek Glasser and a guy who shot under 30% the previous season in Ty Abbott). To overcome this, I got great coaching and help from my brother-in-law, who is passionate about and very talented in woodworking, has a garage full of tools, and has had winning cars before (like Herb Sendek for the Devils and his coaching staff). With his help, I was actually able to to carve and sand a car that looked like what my son wanted. The base paint coat looked great (the Sun Devils’ performance in the regular season and conference schedule). Then my PAC-10 tournament comes, where I have to do detail painting. Much like ASU fell apart against Stanford, I fell apart. The white paint bled a little over the taped lines I made. Some would say it looks horrible, others said it was great, realizing my lack of talent. Luckily, my wife is blessed with the same steady hand for painting as her mother, so she is fixing the lines before the start of the NIT, I mean, Pinewood Derby race, much like the ASU has time to polish things up for the NIT.
Was I disappointed that I couldn’t do the detail painting? Absolutely, but what did I expect? I was already playing with house money, so to say. I don’t consider it a failure. The experience was great. I know what my limitations are for next year, and I totally plan to make an even better car with my son, but have my wife do all the hand painting. (Here’s what the car looks like before my wife fixes some of the detail- not so bad, right?)
The Sun Devil basketball team is in the same situation. Instead of dwelling on what they were unable to do, they need to look back and be proud of the season they played, and look ahead and see the opportunity that they have in the NIT. They are a number one seed. They could win the NIT. Sure its not the Big Dance, but the players would still end their season with a win and would get to cut the net. In the end, it’s the same thing- winning and being a champion. Does it really feel any different? I would doubt it.
So, yes, be disappointed about losing to Stanford and not being selected for the NCAA Tournament, but please do not view this season as a disappointment. These young men performed way beyond anything anyone expected, and may yet garner a championship banner in Wells Fargo Arena. Remember, it’s not a bad date with the varsity cheerleader, but it could end up being something special with a (JV) cheerleader. I’m definitely OK with that.
Drinking is an emotional thing. It joggles you out of the standardism of everyday life … It yanks you out of your body and your mind and throws you against the wall. I have the feeling that drinking is a form of suicide where you’re allowed to return to life and begin all over the next day.
Substitute the word “Drinking” with, “Rooting for the Phoenix Suns” and place the word “fan” before “suicide” and you have encompassed what I interpret as my experience with this team.
In this case, no, it is not – six of those 11 came from 2003-2008, a span during which the Suns could have coasted to that round in a historically pathetic East at least four times.
The question is begged, “Why do the Suns consistently field strong teams that falter mightily in the playoffs?”
The answer is, of course: to kill me.
I hated those Pistons teams of the 2000s – they were arrogant, boring,BORINGand they self-importantly coasted for years off a fluky Finals win over a reeling team whose best players hated each other (one of whom was facing prison time).
I still claim that Detroit only pushed San Antonio to seven games in ‘05 because the Spurs were bored out of their minds.
The point to which the last several statements speak, however, is not that those Pistons teams should be stripped of their accomplishments; rather, the words function as a giant floodlight upon my pathetic bitterness as an NBA fan.
I can say I hate those teams all that I want and I can assert that the Suns have been as good, or better, since 1976 … while their fans simply need to point to the scoreboard.
They win.
I must deal with the Suns – the consummate NBA bridesmaid.
A team for which I challenge anyone to find a parallel in any of the three major professional leagues (this reporter chooses not to recognize hockey, in any capacity).
In this series, I will document the various cases in which I was summarily kicked in the groin by the donkey that is Phoenix Suns Playoff Lore, beginning with the first time …
May 13, 1990
I am nine years old.
I have on one of those shiny, vinyl, olde-timey-lettered purple Suns jackets –inMay– amongst a frenzied crowd in Veterans Memorial Coliseum, which is essentially a giant, 13,000-seat stone saddle that was originally meant for cattle shows, has never fully lost its cattle-ey musk and in which one almost never feels safe, as its structural soundness is decidedly suspect.
The place rattles like a 90 year old drunk when the Suns are humming – the floor shakes violently and the echo of the crowd is like a constant missile assault to the eardrum.
The team has recently escaped a half-decade of mediocrity by fleecing Cleveland in a trade that brought it Kevin Johnson, Ty Corbin, Mark West and a pick that became Dan Majerle (badass defensive/dunking Thunder Dan Majerle, who can’t make a shot beyond 15 feet, not the later 3-point shooting incarnation – no offense to the guy, who was great in both roles, it simply must be pointed out).
Thunder Dan packed a lot more wallop in 1989 than in 1995 … he also packed a lot less shorts.
Sporting some of the league’s most epic white dudes – Rambis, Hornacek, Chambers, Majerle, Legler, all on the same squad – the Suns have just coasted to a 114-101 win in Game 4 of the Western Conference Semifinals, taking a 3-1 lead on the hated, #1-seeded Los Angeles Lakers and a funny thing is happening:
I’m not cowering in the corner, wondering how they are going to screw it up.
Quite the contrary …
For the second year in a row, when I excitedly slipped the “BEAT L.A.” insert – it is so cool that we get to have signs saying this, as it makes me feel like Phoenix is a legitimate pro sports city (while it likely makes pompous Lakers fans snicker, due to their perception that it is anything but) – out of my family’s morning copy of The Arizona Republic, I really believed the Suns could do it.
Why wouldn’t I?
Sure, the Lakers swept the Suns out last year, but that was their first year bouncing back from a 28-54 season … and I am a third-grader who roots for the Detroit Tigers, beginning every year with the assumption that they will win the World Series.
No, I don’t have years of baggage from watching the Suns put forth a consistently scrappy/skillful/lovable effort, then seeing them somehow get pummeled by the sledgehammer of defeat in epic and mind-melting fashion … why do you ask?
I have no time for your nonsensical chicanery – I have to go get prepared for the Suns to finish off L.A., kill Portland and then dispatch Detroit or Chicago in the same manner that they will the others.
Kicked while down
Moving out of my surprisingly insightful 9-year old world – I will fight you tooth-and-nail if you suggest that I wasn’t using phrases such as, “nonsensical chicanery” in ‘90 – the Suns did win Game 5, 106-103.
It became a game and a series that often gets swept under the hearse when people speak of the Suns and their playoff life-and-times.
Why?
Because, after clawing back from an 0-2 deficit to tie Portland, 2-2, the Blazers clipped off two straight wins and left the Suns with pants down and jocks in hand – this is not to say that the Suns didn’t put forth a tremendous effort, as always, but the idea that the team pushed the Lakers out of the way so that another team could walk through the door to the Finals was almost worse than just losing to the Lakers, again, and moving on with sports death/life.
Even worse, Portland managed only one, 1-point victory against Detroit in the Finals, before bowing out in five games – thus crushing the notion that the Suns ever had a true chance.
But the worst part is this – play this game with somebody:
1)Pick a person
2)Ask them who Clyde Drexler’s Portland team beat to make the Finals in 1990
3)Punch them in the face when they say the Lakers
Because, unless this person is some kind of lame/obsessive Phoenix Suns historian – like me – he/she will
guess that it was the Lakers.
It’s only common sense.
I recently mentioned it to my Dad and he didn’t remember it until I reminded him with some details – the man was at the games!
My father’s selective memory aside, the achievement of beating the Lakers in a playoff series for the first time in history was rendered meaningless/a little sad and it became my starting point for the storied litany of great seasons that have been continuously rendered as such in May and June over the last 20 years.
As the Suns spend this season puttering around the second tier of the Western playoffs, it occurs to my greatly-eroded-fan-sense-of-hope that there is a chance that they will play the #1-seeded Lakers in the Western Conference Semifinals … maybe things have come full circle … in which case the Suns would beat them and then lose in the next round …
Which would actually be kind of awesome – does it say something that these last 20 years have made me lust after a fate that so destroyed me at age nine?
Yes.
Yes, it does.
Regardless of what happens – and much as Bukowski woke up from his drunken grave to be reborn so many times (until he didn’t) – the Suns will play again, next year, and I, too, will be reborn with hope that will gradually wane as the season goes on … until it doesn’t.
The National Bar Association (NBA) is seeking applicants for the Crump Law Camp which was established for students entering the 9th through 11th grades and between the ages of 14 and 17 to introduce them to the judicial system.
The Crump Law Camp will be held July 11 - 24, 2010 in Washington, D.C. The application deadline is April 30, 2010.
The goal of the NBA camp is to encourage young people at an early age to become lawyers and seek legal careers in the future. By 2050, more than half of the people in this country will be of color. More than 90 percent of the nation’s lawyers are white, as are more than 80 percent of the students enrolled in law school. Yet more than 30 percent of the United States is comprised of people of color. The NBA is seeking applicants to attend this camp from every ethnic group and its selection process is non-discriminatory.
The first inaugural two-week camp was held during the summer at Howard University School of Law through a grant by the Ford Motor Company Fund in 2001. Campers were and will be housed on the Howard University campus and live in a protected camp environment.
The Camp will have an open enrollment policy and be available to students from across the country; however, emphasis will be on enabling low-income students of color. Campers are selected by the Crump Law Committee.
The camp provides students with an exciting academic and social agenda in the Washington, D. C. area. The competitive highlight of the camp is the Evett L. Simmons Mock Trial Competition. The four winners of this competition are invited to the NBA’s Annual Convention.
To access the applications and more information, visit www.Nationalbar.org and find the Crump Law Camp page.
At this weekend’s National Bike Summit in the nation’s capital, Google is making a splash in the cycling world. The company will announce that they are integrating bike paths/directions into their wildly popular Google Maps service.
Apparently, this was the most requested feature by Google Maps users.
With five days of downtime coming to a close for the Phoenix Suns, the team has been gearing up to tackle the 17 remaining games of the regular season starting with a tip-off against the visiting Lakers tomorrow night.
Having been out of the line-up following wrist surgery in January, the return of Leandro Barbosa to the court is being warmly welcomed. Though Barbosa’s been easing into practices with the team, building up strength in his right hand has been a slow and steady process. “I’m very hungry to come back and help my teammates. I don’t know if I’ll have the same minutes I used to have, but I’m just going to help the team. The bench is playing great, and I just want to add to that.”
Meanwhile Goran Dragic is also expected to make his first re-appearance after suffering a sprained ankle during last week’s match-up with the Clippers. Add to that a (hopefully) completely recuperated Steve Nash and the Suns appear ready to kick things up a few notches to dominate the rest of their season. Though the break saw OKC slide into the Suns’ fifth spot in the Western Conference, six of Phoenix’s next seven games will be played at the Purple Palace. Fingers crossed that the Suns will have more than a home court advantage pushing them into the playoffs; we can expect that a refreshed effort from the bench team will be the team’s upper hand.
The Arizona State Sun Devils enter the 13th annual Pac-10 Tournament in Los Angeles knowing they need at least one win to bolster their resume in an attempt to catch the eye of committee members who will announce the NCAA Tournament field on Sunday.
But the Sun Devils haven’t had the best track record at the Pac-10 Tournament, which started in 1987 and took place for the next four years, before going on hiatus until 2002.
In fact, before last year’s run to the championship game, ASU was just 3-10 all-time in the Pac-10 Tournament, and two of those wins came in 1990, when the tourney was held on their home floor in Tempe. In the second incarnation of the tournament, the Sun Devils were 0-6 before last season.
This year, the Devils are the #2 seed, their highest ever in the Pac-10 Tournament. Their prior high seed was a #4, which happened twice–in 2003 when ASU was knocked off in their first game by Oregon, who went on to win the crown, and last year, when the Devils squandered a 15-point halftime lead in the championship game in a loss to USC.
The number two seed has done very well historically in the tournament, notching a 19-9 record overall, and three times has won the championship (Arizona in 1990 and 2002, and Washington in 2005).
Two years ago, Herb Sendek’s Arizona State Sun Devils gathered as a team to watch the NCAA Tournament field be announced.
The Sun Devils, despite losing their first round Pac-10 Tournament game to USC a few days earlier, were hopeful they’d get in to the field. They were 19-12, 9-9 in the Pac-10, and had improved their win total from the previous season by 11.
They’re name was never called. Instead, their arch-rival, the Arizona Wildcats, a team the Sun Devils had beaten twice during the regular season, and a team that had less regular season wins and a worse conference finish did get in to extend their streak of NCAA Tournament appearances to 24 in a row. ASU was left to play in the NIT, where they advanced to the quarterfinals before losing to Florida.
Many members of that 2008-08 Sun Devils’ squad pointed the finger at that first round loss to USC in the Pac-10 Tournament that kept Arizona State from dancing that year. “If we would have beat them, I think we would have been in”, then-junior Jeff Pendergraph said at the time.
When asked if a win over USC would have punched the Devils’ ticket, Coach Sendek said “Yes. I absolutely do. I think if we would have won one more game anywhere along the trail, it would have been very difficult to keep us out. I think we were one game away in a lot of different directions, winning one more game, having the cards fall another direction in a conference here or there. I think you can reasonably say we were one game away, here, there or somewhere else.”
Fast forward two seasons. The Sun Devils are 22-9, good enough for a 2nd place finish in what everyone around the country is calling a “down year” for the Pac-10. Yet, there’s a strangely familiar feeling for the team as they prepare for their first round Pac-10 Tournament game tonight against the Stanford Cardinal (13-17, 7-11) at Staples Center in Los Angeles. It’s the feeling that ASU needs to win this game against Stanford to get into “The Big Dance”.
“We’re not dumb,” senior point guard Derek Glasser said on Tuesday. “We hear things, we watch ESPN, we read newspapers, so we know what’s going on. I think guys are as focused as they’ve been all year and we’re really preparing as well as we have all year for this week coming up.”
More to the point, Glasser was asked how many wins the Sun Devils need this weekend to feel confident about earning a berth. “I think if we get to the championship, I think we’re for sure in,” he said. “With one win, I think we’re gonna be sitting there Sunday like we were sophomore year (2008) and hoping and praying. I know if we lose on Thursday, we’re not in.”
Junior guard Ty Abbott was very much aligned with Glasser’s thoughts. “We know we have to go to the Pac-10 Tournament and get wins,” he said earlier this week.
So, the journey starts tonight for the 2nd-seeded Sun Devils, playing a Stanford team that they swept during the regular season. In the teams’ first meeting in Tempe, Abbott caught fire for 29 points as ASU breezed to an 88-70 win, leading by as many as 37 points in the process. The 88 points by ASU were their highest offensive output of the Pac-10 season, and 2nd-most overall this season. The Devils scored 104 in a 39-point win against San Francisco in November.
Two weeks ago in Palo Alto, it was ASU senior big man Eric Boateng who inflicted the damage on the Cardinal, hitting all 11 of his field goal attempts and scoring a career-high 24 points in the Sun Devils’ 68-60 win.
Defensively, the Devils have to concern themselves once again with Landry Fields. The senior, who earlier this week was named to the All-Pac-10 First Team, has averaged 20.5 points per game vs. ASU this season. Fields led the conference in scoring at 22.2 points per game. But ASU can’t sleep on Jeremy Green, the sophomore guard who averaged 16.9 points per game to rank 6th in the conference. Green has not shot well against ASU this season, hitting just 25.7% (9 of 35) from the field.
Key for ASU will be getting Boateng involved early. His performance in Palo Alto was no accident. Once he established position inside, he was successful because of his strength advantage against Stanford bigs Jack Trotter and Andrew Zimmerman. In 6 career games against Stanford, Boateng is shooting 95% (19 of 20) from the floor.
Wayne Finlinson consumed just over 2lbs 13 ounces to edge out Mark Reed’s 2lbs 8 ounces to capture Week 2 of the Native New Yorker Battle of the Bone 3 Wing Eating Contest at the Queen Creek Native New Yorker. Finlsinson advances to the finale in August at Chandler Harley Davidson.
The Valley’s premier wing eating competition runs every Wednesday from now through August at a different Native New Yorker in Arizona. 2010’s Grand prize is a Harley from Chandler Harley Davidson and the runner up wins a pair of 2011 Arizona Diamondback season tickets.
To qualify for the finale, just win a Native New Yorker location by eating the most “medium” Native New Yorker chicken wings in 10 minutes and 60 seconds.
This season’s Native New Yorker Battle of the Bone is brought to you by Chandler Harley Davidson, Bud Light, Arizona Diamondbacks, Xyience Energy Drinks, Fox Sports Arizona, Fanster.com, 98 KUPD and The Fan AM 1060. Portions of proceeds will benefit the 100 Club of Arizona.
Note on our weekly results: Nutritiondata.com states that one whole chicken wing (both the paddle and the drumstick portion of the chicken wing) weigh on average 1 oz. Thus providing us with the figure that each wing portion (the drumstick and the paddle) each weigh a half an ounce. So, when it is stated that a contestant has eaten 57 wings, they have eaten the weight that is the equivalent of 57 wings. In actuality they have eaten more than 57 wings, but the actually weight of the meat they have eaten is equivalent to the weight of 57 whole wings.
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(TUCSON, Ariz.) — The Arizona Diamondbacks announced today that they have agreed to terms on a minor league contract with right-handed pitcher Kris Benson, according to D-backs’ Executive Vice President & General Manager Josh Byrnes.
Charles Bukowski, my favorite writer,
Wayne Finlinson consumed just over 2lbs 13 ounces to edge out Mark Reed’s 2lbs 8 ounces to capture Week 2 of the Native New Yorker Battle of the Bone 3 Wing Eating Contest at the Queen Creek Native New Yorker. Finlsinson advances to the finale in August at Chandler Harley Davidson.
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