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“NBA-PLAYOFF PREVIEW”
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The NBA second season, the real season, starts tonight with the Play-In Game, the bottom feeders begin their trek.  Awaiting the survivors are the top teams.

A quick headline look at what is ahead:

MIAMI-CHARLOTTE…The Hornets have had quite a jump up in production.  Launching lots of three’s is their way of life.  Kon Kneuppel and LaMelo Ball are averaging (38) combined a game.  Can they keep it up?  Can they contain the Heat guards and Bam Adebayo.

PORTLAND-PHOENIX..The Blazers have to handle Devin Booker and Dillon Brooks.  No chance.  Can the Suns get beyond their next round?  No chance

76ERS-ORLANDO…Both teams have been battered by injuries. No Joel Embiid in Philly, but there is Paul George and Tyrese Maxey.  The Magic cannot match that with a battered roster.

WARRIORS-CLIPPERS..Great bounceback from a (6-21) start by the Clippers to get to (42-40).  Golden State has struggled to put a healthy lineup on the floor.  Will this be anything more than Steph Curry-Kawhi Leonard shooting contest?  What kind of series will Darius Garland have for LA?

Then you look at the team’s sitting there waiting for the next round:

OKLAHOMA CITY..SGA, Jalen Williams, Chet Holmgren and all that firepower has gotten them 64-wins.  Need I say more?

SAN ANTONIO..Ahead of schedule with Victor Wembenyama and Stephon Castle.  They have arrived.  A 62-win season with a young roster-wow.

DETROIT..From very bad two years ago to dynamic this year, Cade Cunningham and all.  Have to learn how to win come playoff time, but really good.

BOSTON..Tremendous season considering the injuries (Tatum) and the roster defections.  Very good, deep, athletic.

DENVER…Nikola Jokic and his running mates finally look healthy and dangerous.

LAKERS..Red hot, now stone cold reality, the injuries to Doncic-Reaves.  Fear they might be one and done.  They had a great burst, beat some good teams, but how do they stay in games on offense without Luka’s (33P) a night?

HOUSTON…Young, talented, now they add Kevin Durant, but they play erratic ball too.  Alp Segun and young guys who run the floor make up the chemistry.  Will not be an easy out.

ATLANTA…Lots of trades, maybe a good young team that will be better a year from today.  They had a tremendous 25-10 run

MINNESOTA…Who knows if Anthony Edwards can find any consistent help from the rest of the starters.  What kind of series will Rudy Gobert have?

NY KNICKS…Mike Brown got them this far, but Jalen Brunson cannot do this all by himself, so can you trust the rest of the rotation?  Cannot predict if KAT goes MIA.

CLEVELAND..James Harden arrives to join Donovan Mitchell.  Can they keep their bigs on the floor?

TORONTO..Lots of new faces, so don’t know if they are a complete team at this point to run with Scottie Barnes.

So now the real games begin.  See if anyone from outside the circle can challenge the Thunder-Spurs-Pistons-Boston.
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Hacksaw’s Monday Bonus Podcast-1:30pm
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“A GREEN JACKET— AGAIN”
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The guy from Ireland looks good in Green.
The guy from Ireland likes roller coaster rides too.
The guy from Ireland has won his 2nd tourney in a row at Augusta

Rory McIlroy has replaced Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson as the ‘Fan’s Man’
He has now won 6-Grand Slam events and back to back Masters.

He survived a wild 3-days at Augusta.

The spectacular 9-birdie day on Friday that gave him a 6-shot lead, that disappeared.

Saturday brought 4-errant shots off the tee, into the Pine trees, the Azaleas, and twice into the gallery.  Lead gone.

Come Sunday, he was all over the place.  His putter disappeared for awhile.  There was a bogey and a double bogey.  Then with the day about to unravel, he went birdie-birdie on 12-and-13 and made 2-pressure par putts to retain the lead.

The rest of the field chased him, pressured him, a few passed him, but they could not keep up the pressure packed hole-by-hole competition.  And at the end the fans screamed ‘Rory-Rory-Rory’.  It was electric.  And at the end, family hugs were so much fun to see, and you could see the tension leave and the smiles take over.

His longtime Irish playing mate Shane Lowrie was there to hug him too along with a list of other UK-PGA players, an ultimate sign of professional respect.

Scottie Scheffler’s game was MIA for weeks, then he found it, then he lost it.  He went 11-holes without a birdie on Sunday but finished upbeat with a (-11) score, just short.

Justin Rose, the great veteran from England, grinded his way to the top, with 3-birdies in a row, 4-in-8 holes, but then hit bad tee shots at 11-and-14 and never got hot again.

Cam Young surged on Saturday into Sunday, but went 10-holes with a bird on Sunday and bogeys on 6-7-9 ended his chances.

Russ Hendley had 4-birds early but faded

Explosive Tyrell Hatton had 6-birdies and an eagle but ran out of holes, almost duplicated a Friday surge, but served notice he may have arrived as some sort of star despite all his tantrums.

It was such a strange feel when they teed off Thursday morning.  No Tiger, in drug rehab.  No Phil-in the LIV and off the tour with a family illness issue.

Now Rory joins Jack Nicklaus, Nick Faldo and Tiger in winning back to back, the only ones who have done it since the tourney began in 1934.

But at the finish, the long walk to Butler Cabin was really special for McIlroy, special for golf, and now the official crowning of a very special honor for it’s new veteran star.

And across the sea, the Green Isle of Dublin-Belfast-Shannon-Cork and the rest of his nation, decked in Green, has its favorite golfer bringing home another Jacket-colored Green to match the countryside..

Rory McIlroy = Masters Champion

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=====Hacksaw’s Great Sports Weekend Podcast
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“LAKERS SEASON..GONE OFF TRACK”
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So red hot..now a dose of cold reality

The Lakers had come together in March, winning 18-of-20 games.  After a winter of nagging injuries, they redesigned job responsibility.  Got the players to buy in on roles, and reeled off huge wins against alot of upper echelon teams in the Western Conference.

All was looking good, and now all is looking bad.

In a span of 1-game, Luka Doncic went down with a significant hamstring injury.  And later in the same game, Austin Reaves injured an oblique.

Forced to carry a heavy workload, LeBron James has had an arthritic flareup in his foot.

Those guys are the cornerstone of everything that makes the Lakers dangerous, and now they are out.

Oklahoma City promptly beat them the night Luka and AR went down, led the game by 46-at one point.  Then with all three missing in a followup game, the Thunder laid a 36-pointy beating on the Lakers floor.

You look at the Lakers starting five and it is dismal.

They benched Jared Vanderbilt and Rui Hachimura.  DeAndre Ayton gave them a 1-point-3 rebound effort over 23-minutes and he sat too with a (-26) point differential that night against OKC.

Some lineup that includes Jaxon Hayes, Bronny James, Luke Kennard, Jake LaRavia  and whomever else is on the roster.

Shocking something so good, could go so south, so quickly.

And just ahead on the highway next week, the playoffs, as the Lakers plunge from 3rd place on a heater, to as low as 5th place on this ice cold plunge.

Shorthanded in the first round, and knowing full well there will be no Luka-Reaves for 4-to-5 more weeks, how are they supposed to cope with explosive Oklahoma City, the spectacular young San Antonio Spurs, the perennial tough guys Denver, or even hangers on Phoenix?

It has been a roller coaster of a ride for the Lake Show.  Would have never thought I’d be invoking the phrase “1 & Done”.  Sure looks like the Lake Show is about to be cancelled.
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Hacksaw’s Thursday Podcast..1:30pm
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“MINOR LEAGUE BASEBALL–AT ITS WORST”
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The Toronto Blue Jays had scouts in the stands watching their prospects in Class A-ball, as New Hampshire opened the season with Portland in the Eastern League on Tuesday night.

What they saw, no one had ever seen in over a hundred years of baseball.

8-runs scored in one inning, before a hit was recorded.

Understand, it was 35-degrees, there had been snow flurries, and we are dealing with 20-years old pitcher, making their first start, in frigid weather.

If you are keeping score at home…here’s the AP report from the inning.
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The inning started innocently enough with two walks, a wild pitch and a strikeout by Portland starter Hayden Mullins, who struck out the side in the first inning. New Hampshire then plated its first run on a sacrifice fly.

With two outs, Mullins then proceeded to walk the next three batters to tie the score at 2 before he was lifted in favor of reliever Jorge Juan, who hit the first batter he faced with the bases loaded.

A wild pitch allowed the fourth run to cross the plate and a walk loaded them up again for the Fisher Cats. Juan then hit another batter (5-2) and threw another wild pitch (6-2) before walking two more batters (7-2) and exiting the game with the bases again loaded.

Enter Cade Feeney, who eventually got out of the inning but not before throwing a wild pitch (8-2) and giving up a two-run single to Ismael Munguia — the only hit of the inning — to make it 10-2.

New Hampshire held on for a 12-7 victory in the chilly conditions.

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“BAD DAY-AZTECS HOOPS”
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Loyalty has been replaced by greed.
Team has been replaced by me

Welcome to the real world for Brian Dutcher and San Diego State.  For the first time his program has really been stung by defections, mass defections.  Players leaving for reasons that seem to be like throwing the dice on their careers.

They turn their back on the known, good coach, great culture, special era in SDSU basketball.  They are heading into the unknown, hoping for a program that makes them a star, launches them into the NBA, going to work for a strange coach, maybe a different system, surely more cash.

His roster has been wiped out by five players’ decisions to enter the Transfer Portal.

Are they doing anything wrong?  No.  They are part of (1,650) players who entered the Portal on the first day.

Chasing dreams?  Maybe some.
Chasing money? Probably more

A quick look at who is heading out the door.

MAGOON GWATH…In search of health more than anything else.  Seems further away from being an NBA player.  How does he fit in a new system?  Is his career destined to be star-crossed by injury?  Thought staying here was a better option.

MILES BYRD..Gave the school the best he had.  Disappointed after all the time working out with NBA players last year, his offensive game regressed.  Of course his defensive game was great.  1-year somewhere else, maybe they find the consistency to polish his offensive skill set.  Don’t be fooled though.  You know how many leapers and athletes in the NBA who are better than him?  You think he is anywhere close to making an NBA roster?

MILES HEIDE..Thought he grew alot this past year with two and a half years experience under his belt.  Had thought he’d be solid next year in the newly launched Pac 12.  Who knows where he winds up, with his limitations.  Dutcher helped grow him.

BJ DAVIS..Tough loss, good player, looks to be clone of Lamont Butler.  Assume he winds up at a Power Four school.  Probably got tired of being in and out of the starting lineup.

PHARAOH COMPTON..so much upside to him, so someone will pay the price and get a player with the arrow pointing up.  Think it is a huge loss.

End of the day, alot of this is about dollars and that’s too bad.  They leave behind a good program, a nice track record, and a good coach.

College basketball, despite the epic March Madness tourney we have seen, not what it used to be, not what it should be.

Like I said, loyalty no longer important.  Me over team now the ideology.    Money tool

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