Starters

#0 Aaron Brooks (PG)

Aaron Brooks will come back as starting point guard after a stellar year last season, where he won the Most Improved Player honor from the NBA. Brooks led the NBA in three pointers made last season and took on the role of our primary scoring option (at least for the beginning of the season) as the Trevor Ariza experiment kind of failed and Kevin Martin was finding his feet.

This season, Yao is back which means that our guards should get even more open shots as teams try to crowd the middle and double Yao. This should mean more open looks for Aaron Brooks and as long as he keeps up the performances, more points. With several scoring options on the team now, with Yao back and Kevin Martin having the summer to work his way into Adelman’s offense, Brooks will have to tone down his shooting game a bit and look for his teammates. Let’s see if he’s up for the challenge!

#12 Kevin Martin (SG)

When the rockets pulled off the blockbuster deal earlier this year, signing Kevin Martin, Jordan Hill and a couple of other guys, they were making an investment in a young shooting guard who could become our primary scoring option after Tracy McGrady moved on. Kevin Martin took some time to find his feet in Adelman’s offense and although his final season numbers left a bit to be desired (about 21 PPG), he did miss a significant portion of the end of our season, due to injury (and the fact that we were probably not going to qualify to the playoffs).

Here’s hoping that Martin has worked his way into Adelman’s offense over the summer and that he is less of a ball-hog. That stuff worked in Sacramento where apart from Tyreke Evans, he was the only dependable scorer, but the Rockets are looking at several scorers on the roster now, so Martin will need to share the ball a bit. He’s got to be our go-to guy, though!

#1 Trevor Ariza (SF)

Trevor Ariza was our main pickup last offseason after being a pretty clutch player down the stretch for the Lakers in their 2009 NBA championship. With Artest leaving for the Lakers, it was effectively a trade. Artest had been okay for us–his defense had been good but his offense left a lot to be desired.

Unfortunately, Ariza has struggled with more of the same problems during his year at the Rockets. Of course, it was unfair to ask a player coming off the bench to start and be our primary scorer, but I do think Ariza’s talents were overrated a bit.

Ariza contributed 15 points a game last year, but what he was best at was his defense. He’s not as strong as Artest by any stretch of the imagination, but he plays the passing lanes really well and he can finish strong on fast breaks. His nearly 2 steals a game was good enough for #6 in the league. His defensive contribution is inarguable but he definitely needs to improve his shot selection to continue to justify his place in the starting line-up (although we don’t really have much in the bank to replace him with).

#4 Luis Scola (PF)

Luis Scola just signed a huge contract with the Rockets. Although it has not yet been confirmed, the contract is rumored to be worth $47 million over 5 years. Considering that Scola made a little over $3 million last year, that can be considered quite a huge upgrade. And he’s worth it, too.

Scola is an absolute workhorse and probably cannot be matched in the league for hustle. He’s new to the league but he’s shown that good talent can succeed in any league. With Yao out for all of last season, Scola had to step up and help the undersized Chuck Hayes guard the paint. His offense wasn’t bad, either, putting up 16 points a game along with 2 assists. His stat line was certainly impressive.

With Yao back in the starting line-up, Scola will be even more effective in offense on the weak side. Defensively, he’ll probably allow Yao to play smaller minutes and help out a guy like Jordan Hill or Chuck Hayes coming off the bench at the center position. Scola is on the wrong side of youth, though, so his 5-year contract may well see him finish off his career in the Rockets uniform. Let’s hope he can continue contributing as he did last year. Oh, and let’s also hope that he stops flopping so much.

#11 Yao Ming (C)

For a team that was missing it’s starting center (and such a huge one at that), the Rockets did pretty well to finish as the only team in the league with a winning record but no playoff berth. Of course, Adelman tweaked our offense quite a bit to have us run more and play smaller, especially with our 3-guard line-ups and with Chuck Hayes starting at center.

Our offense this year is going to be a lot different with Yao coming  back, and especially a ginger-footed Yao coming back (one who cannot really run the court, if he even had that ability before–luckily we have Scola for that!). However, it will not hurt to have a shot-blocking presence in the paint once again.

At his peak, Yao was getting 20 points and 10 rebounds a game. He’s going to be a lot less than that statistically speaking, but I think he’s going to have a huge effect on the intangibles. With Brooks, Martin and Ariza all able 3-point shooters, we should be able to work an inside-outside game into our offense. We just need to keep Yao healthy, which means he’s probably going to have low minutes. I sure hope Jack Sikma has been working Jordan Hill into NBA shape!

Bench

The Rockets have the luxury of having one of the deeper benches in the league, although some of that advantage is wiped out by not having an incandescent (I’m stealing a word from NBA 2K10, here) starting line-up. Let’s take a look at our bench:

Centers

Our back-up centers list consists of David Anderson and Chuck Hayes with Jordan Hill filling in sometimes. Certainly not an impressive list, but one that is capable. David Anderson is a different kind of center in that he has almost no post game but has a really good outside shot. However, towards the end of last season he was showing off a few post moves, so hopefully an offseason with Sikma will have done him wonders. The Chuckwagon is… well… the Chuckwagon. He’s not going to blow anyone away, but he’s had a few good games.

Power Forwards

Our power forwards list consists of Jordan Hill, Jared Jeffries and Patrick Patterson. Of this bunch, I think Hill is probably the biggest prospect because he’s young, tall and athletic. Recent press from Sikma suggests that Hill hasn’t developed as quickly as desired. I’m hoping that they are just being tight-lipped about it! Jeffries is a decent back-up forward. He gets a lot of offensive boards and doesn’t like dunking. He’s more in the team to fill up minutes and I suppose clear cap space next season when his contract expires. Patrick Patterson is our first round draft pick but I unfortunately did not follow enough NCAA basketball to comment on him.

Small Forwards

Our backup small forwards come in the form of Chase Budinger, Shane Battier and Mike Harris (if he get’s re-signed from the D-League). Budinger could be more accurately classified as a shooting guard given how much of a scorer he is, but he’s usually not playing that position when he’s in the rotation. Budinger remains one of our shinier prospects off the bench next year. Battier used to be our defensive backbone but his performances have fallen off a bit. I personally think his best basketball is past him, but he could still be useful, given that most of our current line-up is all offense and not so much defense. Harris came from Rice (woot!) and has been dominating the D-League without managing to secure a long-term NBA contract. He’s around more for backup due to injury.

Guards

The final two players off the bench are Kyle Lowry, who recently signed a 4-year deal worth $24 million, and Jermaine Taylor. Taylor is a scrub, so not much to talk about him (apart from his great athletic ability). Lowry if a player who is coming into his own in the NBA, as our 3-guard rotations demonstrated last year. He’s great at running the fast-break and drawing fouls and he’s also worked a hell of a lot on his 3-point shot. Lowry is a pass-first point guard so he would be useful in situations where Brooks is not shooting well. Definitely a good guy to hang on to, although I foresee him being traded away towards the end of his contract.

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So that’s basically it! I’m pumped for the NBA season although there are still several months to go!

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This seems like as good a time as any to compare these two world bodies of a global sport. Both the International Cricket Council (ICC) and the Federation Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) have been at the center of controversy over the last few weeks, albeit for very different reasons. Let’s take a look at each organization’s problems.

FIFA is in the middle of hosting the world’s largest sporting event, at least by viewership. The FIFA World Cup is a global showcase of some of the world’s most well-paid athletes and is a spectacle that is much larger than the globally reaching Olympics. Football/soccer is a game that anyone in the world can play anywhere as long as they have a rotund object that rolls around and the imagination to conjure up goalposts out of items lying around or, well, imagination.

However, FIFA has had it’s share of controversies during this world cup–almost all of them stemming from very poor officiating. Like cricket and most other sports, football uses humans to officiate and referee the game to make sure it’s played fairly and within the rules. Unlike almost every other sport played at an international level, these officials have no benefit of using any technology. This lack of technology has very strongly highlighted the err part of the “to err is human” idiom.

It started out with some very tame offside calls and non-offside calls. Fine, that’s okay since the offside is very difficult to pick out during live coverage, even for a viewer. However, this quickly grew into unfathomable calls (such as the mysterious foul that was called on the US against Slovenia, erasing their game winner) and ones that were downright wrong (such as Lampard’s goal being discounted because 2 yards into the goal was apparently not quite enough). There was also an offside call that went against Mexico against Argentina that could have been used as a precise example when explaining what the offside rule was to a newcomer to the sport.

Anyhow, humans make mistakes and that’s acceptable. What is unacceptable is the lack of accountability both by FIFA and the referees themselves. And the lack of desire to actually move the game into the current decade. Let’s tackle the first issue here–accountability. It took a ball that was yards into the goal being called a no-score that required Sepp Blatter to publicly apologize to the relevant national football associations. The other way Blatter has responded to criticism of his referees is by sending them home. Wouldn’t it just be easier for the referees to apologize themselves and accept that they’ve made a mistake? Or in some cases, explain the thinking behind the call (I’m still looking at that US goal against Slovenia and wondering where the foul was called).

When Jim Joyce missed a call that robbed a pitcher of a perfect game, he apologized publicly in the press conference that followed. He actually felt bad. I’m sure if FIFA referees were provided a mouthpiece to voice their sorrow for missing a call, much of the football-watching fraternity would be appeased. Sure, they’d still be pissed off, but at least they would realize that they were right (and they have been right). Just sitting quietly and pretending a problem doesn’t exist just aggravates it further. Throughout the last few world cups, mistakes have been piling up quicker and quicker. And they’re becoming very evident thanks to technology.

Which brings me to my  next point: technology (see that awesome segue?). As I mentioned earlier, FIFA is probably the only global sports organization that has shunned technology to be used to improve the quality of games. And in my opinion, it’s shunning is completely ridiculous. People who are agreeing with FIFA here provide reasons such as “maintain the human element” and “maintain the flow of the game”. Let me pick apart each of these points one-by-one.

The only reason we used the human element in the first place is because we had no way to rewind time. If there were cameras available when the sport was first played, do you think we would still have preferred to pay 4 guys to twiddle their thumbs and run around in short shorts and striped flags? No. The concentration would be to get the call right–after all the rules were designed for a reason. As a viewer of many, many sports, I choose to watch the game because I want to see uber-talented athletes compete against each other. I don’t watch basketball, cricket, football, soccer or any sport to see referees maintain the human element. The players are human–they’re hardly competing using controllers hooked up to a PS3! When watching football, I want to see a side clawing back to even a game or take a late lead or see an inch-perfect through pass beating an offside trap to set up a striker on goal. I don’t want to see the referees lifting their flags, blowing their whistles and shoving plastic cards in players’ faces (although the cautioning system is very warranted and one I think a lot of other contact sports could do with).

Secondly, the detractors of technology claim that technology would affect the flow of the game. Excuse me! Are we watching the same sport? Maybe this argument would have made sense 5-10 years ago when players played a tough game. Now, football is probably the most interrupted game out there. Play constantly stops and starts and stops and starts as the smallest of touches causes players to fly to the ground as if they’ve been laid out by a bareknuckle boxing champion’s knockout punch. I would really like to see a comparison of how many fouls we had at the 1998 World Cup compared to the 2010 World Cup. I think the increase would be several-fold.

Furthermore, when any controversial decision happens, minutes are wasted while players argue with the referee and the referee consults all his help. In fact, many a time, the correct decision has already been displayed to TV viewers before play has restarted. I would argue that going to technology would actually save the time wasted by the arguing and the bickering–since play would actually be reviewed, players could have no complaints because they would obviously have been right/wrong.

So how should one address this problem? I think allowing referees to attend press conferences is a must. FIFA may think it is protecting the referees by preventing them to address the media but I think it is doing a lot of harm to their image and the referees image. While referees who make such poor decisions in such a huge public light are always going to have it follow them around for the rest of their career, the least they could do is allow an asterisk to a note that says that the official in question actually admitted he was wrong and was sorry.

As for technology, I think it needs to be slowly inducted into the game. I’m not for the whole microchip idea in the shoes and the ball to determine offsides–that seems overly unnecessary. I think technology should be used in two cases: (1) whenever a goal has been scored whose validity is called into question (offside, goal-line decisions, fouls, etc.) and (2) when a player has been fouled in the box to determine if a dive was involved. There’s no need to spend a bunch of money developing goal line technology or stationing officials all over the field. Taking these two steps combined with the TV replays already available would help the game significantly and not waste too much time on the field. A fifth official would simply be reviewing the TV evidence while the game is progressing and if they see a bad call, just walkie into the main official on the pitch.

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Cricket has suffered from similar problems for ages. For a game that is several centuries older than football, I think the ICC has done a great job in inducting technology into the game. In the next part of this series, I’ll look at how the ICC has approached technology with regards to the international game and where they have gone right or wrong. Finally, I’ll take a look at the political aspect of this discussion, since that’s the issue that has plagued the ICC recently.

To recap, Google added the ability for you to specify a background image on your Google homepage, the effect of which made it look a bit like Bing (but in reality a lot different–Bing’s graphical homepage is actually a lot more feature-ful). Furthermore, you could actually choose which “theme” you wanted and could even upload your own stuff or do a Google Images search for a graphic you wished to use. What’s the issue?

Apparently some Google users feel like they have some ownership of how the page should look. There were actually people demanding that Google return the homepage to the default state or add some sort of “easy to click” option to do so. Really? It’s just a homepage. The page behaves exactly the same. The only thing I’m really worried about is whether the Google logo will still be customized on special days–as that’s the only reason I actually go to the Google homepage (I use my Firefox search bar for everything else).

Seriously, people, find something better to complain about. Like that oil spill or whales dying or something.

A good start, for the first time in the Super 8 stage…

India started out well with a new opening partnership of Gautam Gambhir and Dinesh Karthik. Karthik looked energetic and lively and gave India a good start along with Gambhir. Karthik fell to a ball that stopped on him and produced a leading edge, but Raina and Gambhir steadied the ship. In fact, India reached 90/1 after the first 10 and it looked like we were really well-placed to make a strong score and be in with a chance to remain in the West Indies.

However, it was important to note that we weren’t really scoring our runs in boundaries or sixes–more in singles and twos. The pitch and outfield were certainly slow (it took GG about 3 overs to figure out that he shouldn’t pose after each of his drives, which cost us about a run every shot), but it seemed like we were content with poking it around and building a base. Fair enough…

Anti-climactic finish to the innings…

With a finishing crew boasting of big hitters such as Yuvraj, Yusuf, Dhoni and even Rohit, who can tee off on his day, it seemed like the stage had been perfectly set. But what ended up happening was extremely strange and anti-climactic. The hits just never came. As we moved into the 13th/14th over, I began to worry that we had left it too long. Big hitting doesn’t just happen. You can’t flip the switch and start stroking sixes. But it appeared like that’s what we thought. The overs leading up to the slog overs actually decreased our scoring rate. Instead of getting at least a run every ball, we were getting 3-5 runs an over.

When the time came to slog, we all began playing Jadeja-esque cover drives (you know, the type where we need three sixes but he middles it straight to cover?). I think mentally we were already out of the tournament and the players just didn’t make the effort to adjust to the different pitch. We ended up with just 163 runs on the board, scoring a measly 73 runs in our last 10 overs. Worse, we lost only 4 wickets. There was no intent and no execution. To keep ourselves in the hunt, we’d have to bowl the Lankans out for 143 or lower.

Great start with the bowling…

Our bowling innings got off to a dream start with Jayawardene and Jayasuriya back in the hut in the first 2 overs. I believe Sri Lanka were 6/2 at one stage with captain Sanga and Tillakaratne Dilshan at the crease. Dilshan clearly held the key, from my viewpoint at that stage. He was the one who was capable of keeping the scoring rate going while Sanga dug in and prepared to last it out till the end. And Dilshan did exactly that. He took a sword to the Indian attack that should have been rampaging. Instead of keeping the runs down in the Power Play after taking the two early wickets, we leaked them.

Luckily for us, Dilshan holed out to deep mid wicket off a mis-time sweep shot, both physically speaking and from the context of the game. Sanga gave him a piece of his mind, and it looked like we were back in the hunt again. The very able Angelo Mathews joined his captain at the crease… I can’t remember off-hand but I think this guy has been a thorn in our flesh in the past.

A Sanga special followed by a bludgeoning finish…

Sangakkara built a wonderful base based on singles, twos and the occasional boundary and then did what our top order should have done–hit out. He rendered Harbhajan Singh largely useless today and smacked a few sixes off our part-timers as well. Sri Lanka looked to have been out of the hunt from the perspective of the game, but always kept the magic target of 143 at an easy 7.5RPO with wickets in hand. By the time Sanga perished to a Vinay Kumar slower ball, Sri Lanka were well on their way to knock India out.

Angelo Mathews ensured that with a series of powerful strokes that found and crossed the boundary with ease. Again, the distinct contrast between the Sri Lankan death bowling and our death bowling was easily evident, as was the application and intent of their finishers compared to ours. They just wanted it more and it couldn’t have been more obvious. When Angelo Mathews was run out, Sri Lanka had not only knocked India out, but they were well back in the game, requiring 3 runs off the last ball. They had done this courtesy of 3 consecutive sixes–2 off Vinay Kumar and 1 off Nehra. With 3 runs required off one ball, the advantage had to be with India, since the Lankans basically needed a boundary to win the game. Perera, who had bowled so well earlier in the game to restrict the Indians, finished with a flourish and dispatched the ball over the cover boundary to complete a magnificent win for the Lankans.

What it means for the West Indies…

India can now confirm their return tickets from the Carribbean, but Sri Lanka and West Indies are still in the hunt for the second semifinal spot (it would take quite a massive loss for the Aussies to be knocked out). The equation for the Windies is as follows:

Batting First: West Indies need to win by 24 runs or more
Fielding First: West Indies need to chase down the total between 16 and 18 overs depending on the target.

Starting off with poor team selection…

When captains stick to players who have failed, they are putting a vote of confidence in those players. This is generally a good thing to do, except if the player you are putting your confidence on is as pathetic a Twenty20 player as Ravindra Jadeja. I singled Jadeja out for a bashing in the previous match and I will do so here, again. However, today Dhoni takes the blame for selecting him in the first place. Once again, Jadeja made his effect felt in the match in all facets of the game. He started off with a misfield off a simple pick-up in the circle early in the game. He then went on to drop Chanderpaul, who added only 9 more runs but more importantly allowed a huge opening partnership to set the platform for a late onslaught.

When he came on to bowl, Jadeja leaked 27 runs in his 2 overs, which puts his total at about 60 runs in the 4 overs he has bowled in this edition’s Super 8. His first over featured 2 sixes in the first four balls, which coupled with the fact that he had given 6 sixes off his last 9 balls in the previous match, meant that Jadeja has given 8 sixes off his last 13 balls. That’s better than a six every other ball. That’s 4 sixes an over. Yet, he gets selected by Dhoni.

Finally, Jadeja was issued a vote of no-confidence by Dhoni when Harbhajan was sent in ahead of him in the batting order. A good decision, too, because Bhajji actually knows how to wield the long handle. Jadeja couldn’t even clear the infield when he was batting. In fact, he couldn’t even hit the ball in the air when we needed it to rain sixes. Sure, you don’t have the talent or strength to smack a maximum, but what about intent?

To summarize this tirade, please get Ravindra Jadeja the hell out of the Twenty20 squad. I don’t care if  you select him for ODIs or Tests but this guy should be way behind in the pecking order. India would have been so much better off by picking a real bowler and not going in with three specialists only. Sure, there’s the thought that our batsmen would be skittled out by the short deliveries (which they were. But if 7 batsmen are going to get out to bouncers, the 8th one isn’t likely to play a game-changer. Jadeja contributes nothing with the bat or ball. We should have played Piyush or Vijay Kumar.

Batting continues to struggle against short bowling…

The Indian team has NO EXCUSE for this one. They could have played the “surprise” card at the World Twenty20 in England last year when we were bounced out by the West Indies and then England. However, we’ve now had 10 months to fix it. We’ve known that the Twenty20 World Cup is going to be in the West Indies for a couple of years, now. We’ve known that we are shit against short bowling. But instead of doing anything, we prepare for the fiesta that is the IPL and its flurry of flat tracks. The fact that we don’t have a single pace bowler who can hit 140k’s is embarrassing in itself. The fact that international grade cricketers can’t pull the ball is pathetic. How the hell are these guys going to play ODIs and Tests outside of the subcontinent?

The mathematical uncertainty…

There is a tiny ray of hope for India to qualify to the next round. First, Australia will need to wallop both Sri Lanka and West Indies. Then, we will need to wallop Sri Lanka. This will put Australia at 6 points and India, West Indies and Sri Lanka at 2 points. However, for this to happen, Sri Lanka will need to be destroyed by both Australia and us since their NRR is at an imposing +2.850 compared t our -1.575.  I’ll post a mathematical update at the completion of the Australia-Sri Lanka game in the event that Australia win. To recap, if Sri Lanka win, India is mathematically eliminated. This will put Sri Lanka at 2 wins and since Australia and West Indies both have 1 win each and play each other, one of them will have 2 wins, which is more than India can manage.

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Australia go in with 5 front-line bowlers. India went in with 3. </discussion>

A rare maiden followed by some ordinary bowling…

India started out really well with Harbhajan opening the bowling in an increasingly obvious “change-up” move. Bhajji started things off with a well-bowled maiden in an over that featured flight, variations in pace and length. While Watson and Warner were still getting their eye in, Bhajji stuck to the basics and bowled good line and length. That’s something no other bowler managed throughout the rest of the innings.

For one, all our bowlers save for Harbhajan had some sort of addiction for the long hop. I don’t know if it was because they were nervous and were letting go of the ball late or if they were just inept. Everyone from ZaK to Nehra to Ravindra Jadeja to Yuvi to Yusuf bowled rank long hops. Watson (who has modified his Twenty20 game to feature a baseball-like swing) and Warner made the most of it by taking advantage of the short boundaries to amass sixer after sixer. At one stage, Ravi Jadeja had given away sixes in six straight deliveries (although 3 of them were the end of one over and the other 3 the beginning of his next). It was particularly frustrating that I, the viewer, knew exactly what the problem was. Ball after ball our bowlers would pitch it short and the batsman would hoick it away for a maximum. The Aussies hit 16 sixes, which is just one short of the record for most sixes in a Twenty20 innings.

Pulling it back to make it a manageable target…

When I left to watch the rest of the game at the local Manchester United Pub in Phoenix Mills, the Aussies had about 160 in 16 overs. By the time I reached my destination, India had pulled it back to give only 25 runs in the last 4 thanks to some decent bowling by Yuvraj, Zaheer and Nehra (I didn’t get a chance to watch any of these overs). 185 against a quick Aussie line-up on a flattish pitch is no easy task, but it was certainly better than staring at a 200+ target. I was quietly optimistic, although my cousin had suggested before leaving that the Indian batsmen, having seen the Aussies smash short balls from their spinners all afternoon, would attempt the same unsuccessfully against the Australian fast bowlers. A more accurate prediction had never been made…

Poor shot selection leads to an ordinary start

Gambhir and Vijay seemed to start off on the right foot–the front foot, that is. I didn’t expect Australia to feed us with a barrage of delectable long hops, but it seems like our batsmen expected it. After a quiet, but safe, start, the innings began to unravel. Vijay, Gambhir and Raina fell within the space of 10 balls, all to pathetic shots. Vijay tried to force a delivery to the leg side that could have been comfortable hit down the ground, Gambhir hit an extremely ugly mistimed pull to mid-wicket and Raina top-edged a horrible pull shot off Tait that is guaranteed to get him some short bowling for a few more years of his young career. The three shots not only effectively gave us an extremely poor start to a difficult run chase, but demonstrate that even our batsmen hadn’t come to the game with their brains in their heads. First it had been the bowlers who seemed adamant to drop every ball short with their lack of pace, and now the batsmen were trying to pull 90+ mph bowlers across the line with all their power. It was a disaster waiting to happen, and it happened.

Rohit shines as the middle order collapses

At 17/3, you’d expect some sanity entering the proceedings and the batsmen at the crease trying to play themselves in. Unfortunately, that was not to happen. Yuvi was outdone by a brilliant yorker from Nannes (I think it was the first yorker of the day, too, I don’t recall our bowlers bowling anything but long hops) in what I thought was the only Indian wicket where the batsman could be given the benefit of the doubt. With Yuvi dismissed, I lost all hope of a miraculous comeback. Dhoni and Yusuf confirmed this, the former with a completely unrequired slog to long-on and Yusuf with a mindless swipe that caught an edge and flew in the air before being pouched smartly by Warner, running in from the deep cover-point boundary. At that stage, India were 42/6 and it looked like we would be bundled out for less than Bangladesh a couple of nights ago, and in fact less than 100.

Luckily, Rohit Sharma began playing a beautiful innings that allowed us to save some face and, more importantly, some net run rate (although we still ended the day with a NRR of -2.45). Sharma was the only top-order Indian batsman who tried playing straight (apart from Dhoni, I guess) and he was the only one who demonstrated how short the straight boundaries were. Rohit ended up with 4 fours and 6 sixes in his innings and even mistimed lofted drives were clearing the boundary with ease. While Watson and Warner played awesomely powerful innings, there’s no doubting that they were aided by the small field–something that no Indian batsman attempted to use to their advantage.

Harbhajan and Zaheer played cameo innings before the innings fizzled to a close on the back of a Shaun Tait over (Rohit probably should have sheltered the two instead of putting them on strike against Tait–but it would have taken a very optimistic and egotistical batsman to do that with 2 wickets in hand and 50 odd runs to get in 3 overs). In fact, Harbhajan was the second highest scorer at 13 runs (third was Extras) and he outscored Murali Vijay, Suresh Raina, Yuvraj Singh, Yusuf Pathan and MS Dhoni. Combined. I think that statistic tells all, really–the Indian batsmen didn’t really apply themselves at all (except for Rohit).

Things to take from this game…

India still have 2 games to go and if we manage to win both of these, we could possibly still qualify to the semis. Of course, being beaten so strongly isn’t going to do any favours to our NRR. As I type, it looks like the West Indies will fall short against the Sirils, so we have to hope that they beat the Aussies and that the Lankans lose to the Aussies (and we win, of course, against both of these teams…that’s a necessity). It’s never nice to play the NRR game, though. In the two previous editions of this tournament, we have been in a similar situation–requiring victories of our final two Super 8 games to go to the semis. In the first edition, we won against England and South Africa and the rest, as they say, is history. Last year, though, we lost to those very teams and hence were knocked out. I would definitely take West Indies and Sri Lanka over England and South Africa, but it’s safe to say that it is an uphill climb from here.

Other comments I have to make are as follows. First, Ravindra Jadeja. I don’t know how this bloke still makes it to our Twenty20 team. He was a crap Twenty20 player last year and he is still an insult to many more qualified players in our country. The guy’s only saving grace is his economy while bowling (I believe his economy hovered around 7.00 before this game) and that went for a toss today. His batting just isn’t aggressive or imposing enough to be a factor in a Twenty20 game–he’s not going to win games as a finisher and he doesn’t rotate the strike well enough to recover from early wickets (such as today). As I remarked around this time last year, when Jadeja almost single-handedly lost us the game against England, he just does not deserve his Twenty20 cap. Today, he caused a massive momentum shift from a decent first 2 overs to one where he gave away 19 runs. I’m all for him playing in ODIs and Tests (in a few seasons, of course), where he has more time to work his game, but he’ s not a good player for this format.

Second, short-bowling. It is obvious that we have troubles with short bowling. This was evident in the game we played last year, against the West Indies, where all 7 of our wickets fell to Bravo/Edwards and our first three wickets had been snaffled out for 29 runs. Not a lot has changed this year. It seems our batsmen still feel like every short ball must be pulled, regardless of pace, line and (lack of) talent. Yuvi is the only batsman in our team who I can confidently say knows how to pull the ball. The other guys need to work it out in the nets, not in the middle of a crunch game against Australia. We will likely be tested with the short balls against the West Indies on Sunday with Kemar Roach and Jerome Taylor both 90+ mph bowlers. Sri Lanka will be slightly better, but we may well be out of the tournament by then (not to mention our old tormentor, Ajantha Mendis, seems to have hit some form).

Finally, opening is an issue for us. We have been spoiled by the ease with which Virender Sehwag dents opening attacks. Sehwag is good at using the pace of the bowlers he faces to get his runs. Although he struggles against the short balls, he is smart enough to know that he can’t pull a brisk pace bowler against the line and instead employs an uppercut shot. With the boundaries as short as they are, Sehwag could well have got a couple of sixes in that direction and made the Aussies rethink their bounce strategy. As it stands, our openin lineup right now is very weak indeed. Gambhir has looked like he misplaced his bats in his kit and Vijay only looked good against Afghanistan, against whom he only scored at a strike rate of a shade over 100. Our opening partnership needs to click if we want to survive till the next round of this tournament.

1. You contact Company X about Product Y.
2. The sales rep. of the company does a good job convincing you of buying the product. You decide to go ahead and buy it.
3. The sales rep. promises delivery of Product Y the next day. An experienced fake conner will realize this could raise suspicion and promises delivery in 48 hours or something to that effect.
4. The intended date of delivery swings around and there’s no sign of delivery.
5. You get in touch with the sales rep. in the afternoon, after lunch. He promises delivery in the evening.
6. Evening turns into night but there’s no sign of delivery.
7. You get in touch with the sales rep. in the late evening, just before dinner. He promises delivery the next morning.
8. You give the sales rep. a piece of your mind, but you were expecting some sort of delay in delivery (this is India after all).
9. The next day, you repeat steps 5-7. You are now getting annoyed.
10. The day after, the sales rep. phone appears to be out of service. In reality, the sales rep. is just ignoring your calls.
11. You try calling customer service but of course they have no record of your application for Product Y. In fact, you have to call several different customer service centers and give a lot of information. The standard response is that they will tell you to wait another period of the initial waiting period (for example, 48 hours).

This is how it is so far. There are now two paths you can follow. If you happen to know someone senior level in Company X, you get in touch with them. Power hierarchy works as good as it always does and:

12. You get delivery of the product that day.

Your saga thus ends. You never hear back from the original sales representative. He has clearly been humbled. However, not everyone has the benefit of this situation so what probably happens is:

12. You make more calls, more complaints.
13. You finally realize the hopelessness of your situation and give up trying.
14. You get delivery of the product a few days later.

As you can see, it feels like you are getting swindled the whole way, but what is actually happening is that the level of service is extremely poor. The product and company are legitimate, it is just that the sales team is too disconnected from the delivery/engineering team and in general they are just too lazy. There is no respect for a customer’s time and no guaranteed response time.

Most recently, this happened with us with TATA, whose high-speed internet service plan we were trying to get so that I could VPN effectively. Just a few days prior to that, a similar thing happened to my cousin when he was trying to buy a car. It’s happened for ages and I have no doubt it’ll happen for ages more. There just seems to be no semblance of professionalism and accountability in some customer-facing industries in India.

Eastern Conference
Cleveland (1) vs. Chicago (8): Cavs 4-1 (Prediction: Cavs 4-0)
Orlando (2) vs. Charlotte (7): Magic 4-0 (Prediction: Magic 4-1)
Atlanta (3) vs. Milwaukee (6): Series tied 3-3 (Prediction: Hawks 4-2)
Boston (4) vs. Miami (5): Celtics 4-1 (Prediction: Celtics 4-2)

So I’ve got 3 of the 4 series winners right (and could get the Hawks-Bucks match-up as well). Unfortunately, I didn’t get any of the scorelines right! Apart from the Hawks-Bucks tussle, everything really went as planned. Which is not really a surprise since the East was pretty segmented in terms of strong teams and weak teams.

Western Conference:
L.A. (1) vs. Oklahama City (8): Lakers 4-2 (Prediction: Lakers 4-1)
Dallas (2) vs. San Antonio (7): Spurs 4-2 (Prediction: Spurs 4-3)
Phoenix (3) vs. Portland (6): Suns 4-2 (Prediction: Suns 4-2)
Denver (4) vs. Utah (5): Jazz 4-2 (Prediction: Nuggets 4-1)

My predictions here were kind of all over the place. While I nailed down 3 of the series winners and even one scoreline, I predicted pretty badly on the Nuggets-Jazz match up. To my credit, the 4-5 seed match-up is always a bit harder to predict! But seriously, the Jazz surprised me with their performance. Boozer looked unstoppable and Nuggets were missing George Karl a lot more than I expected. Not particularly happy, either, since I hate the Jazz (and the Spurs).

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Let’s take a look at Round 2, now, the conference semi-finals. These are a lot harder to predict, but I’ll take a swing, anyway.

Eastern Conference

Cleveland Cavaliers (1) vs. Boston Celtics (4) — Cleveland leads 1-0

Game 1 was pretty hotly contested with the Celtics leading most of the way before the Cavs took over down the stretch. LeBron had another good performance and the Cavs have taken the lead and maintained home-court advantage. This series is difficult to call because you never know how well the Celtics’ veterans are going to play. Ray Allen had an okay night and has had only an okay playoffs with bursts. LeBron, the regular-season MVP, has being gunning at full power. I think the Cavs will win this one and it won’t go the stretch, but I’m not sure how many games it will take.

PREDICTION: Cavaliers 4-2

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Orlando Magic (2) vs. Atlanta Hawks (3)/Milwaukee Bucks (4) — TBD

Hard to call a series that hasn’t even had the opponents determined yet! The Bucks are challenging the Hawks well, and it seems that Atlanta has been suffering from at least some level of complacency. Brandon Jennings is aiming for a fairy-tale finish in his rookie playoff series. I think Orlando will win the series to set up an EC final clash with the Cavaliers, but the scoreline depends on who they are facing.

PREDICTION: Magic 4-2 (vs. Hawks); Magic 4-1 (vs. Bucks)

Now, the Western Conference…

Western Conference

L.A. Lakers (1) vs. Utah Jazz (5)

The Lakers are coming off a harder-than-expected battle against the inspiring Oklahoma City Thunder whereas the Jazz have polished up the Nuggets in the first round pretty easily. The Lakers bench has finally began to show signs of life, punching in 30 points in Game 6 against the Thunder. However, they are still dependent on their starters and with Bynum injured for potentially a few games, they could be in a bit of a hole. The Jazz have learned to play well without a few of their regulars, but I think the Lakers play far too good team basketball to be outdone in similar fashion to the Nuggets. Boozer will find it harder to score against the likes of Gasol and Bynum (provided he’s back). Deron Williams is likely to draw Artest as his defender and we all saw how poorly KD shot during the first-round match-up. I’m going with the Lakers in 6.

PREDICTION: Lakers 4-2

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Phoenix Suns (3) vs. San Antonio Spurs (7)

The Suns will be happy to have landed home-court advantage here, since at the beginning of the playoffs they would have undoubtedly been preparing for a second-round match-up with the hot Dallas Mavericks. The Suns ended up cleaning the heavily-injured Trailblazers in 6, probably a game or two longer than they would have liked. Phoenix cannot afford to lose home-court advantage to the Spurs in this series, especially not as early as the Mavericks lost it. The Spurs are playing some really hot basketball right now with George Hill on absolute fire. The big three of Ginobili, Parker and Duncan haven’t really been firing on all cylinders, either, so it would be scary to think of the possibilities if all four of those guys are playing well. I’m supporting the Suns, as usual, but I think the Spurs will take this. I will be very disappointed if they do so, since they would effectively have taken out 3 of the teams I do support in the West (Houston couldn’t make a playoff spot, Dallas in the first round and now, Phoenix).

PREDICTION: Spurs 4-3

Bring on the second round!

First, there’s “Open”.

Jobs’ claim here is basically a fact. Flash is a proprietary system. Not only do you need to buy expensive software from Adobe to be able to create professional-grade Flash applications, but you also need to download a third-party plug-in from them any time you want to view it. There’s no complaints I have about this statement except that it reminds me of, you know, pot-kettle-black.

Apple is possibly the most proprietary technology developer out there right now. Not only is the iPhone OS system completely closed and regulated, but even going back to the OS X operating system, you legally need a Mac to run that. It sounds highly hypocritical of a CEO of such a proprietary company using “openness” to attack Adobe. To Jobs’ credit, he accepts that Apple is proprietary, but he wants the web to be open. How benevolent of him to allow us this luxury!

Second, there’s the “full web”.

Adobe has counter-claimed Apple’s claim that the iPad is the best way to experience the web, by suggesting that those users do not have access to the full web. Jobs’ counter-argument to this is that Apple supports HTML5, CSS and the modern H.264 format for viewing video. He also rattles off a list of 16 sites that supposedly support video on the iPhone OS (although at least one of them–Facebook–at least check, does not).

As I said at the beginning of this piece, I hate it when a website has used Flash for the purpose of web-design (especially when they haven’t offered an HTML alternative). So from that standpoint, I’m happy that Apple has gone ahead and blocked those websites. However, when it comes to videos, Apple is just ignoring the problem. Sure… they support these 18 sites that now allow HTML5-based streaming. But about the 1000 other websites that people actually visit? How can you advertise a device as being the best way to browse the web when it falls annoyingly short in multimedia presentation? Companies have paid millions of dollars implementing their current content delivery platforms–not everyone has the financial resources that YouTube, for example, has, to begin supporting H.264 video overnight.

Third, there’s reliability, security and performance.

I have heard several anecdotes about how Flash causes Macs to barf. Jobs labels Flash as the number one reason for Mac crashes. Obviously Adobe has a part to play here, since they are the ones that are writing the actual plug-ins. But I don’t buy the whole “reliability, security, performance” argument for the iPhone OS. Just like I don’t buy the justification that Apple fanboys give for keeping the App platform closed or for keeping OS X locked down to Mac hardware–to preserve the quality of the system. How dumb do they think consumers are? The App Store is already plush full of useless applications (I believe Fart Apps deserve their own category going by volume, right?). In fact, I can count the number of apps I use regularly on my iPhone on one hand.

This destroys the perception that it is impossible to create low-quality applications staying within Apple’s development platform and regulation. The theory that it is impossible to create a quality application outside of the Apple-allowed platform is similarly debunked by the “black market” that is Apple jailbroken apps. There are several quality applications developed there that would deserve their place in the App Store if Apple had put it’s draconian policies aside. Not to mention that they’ve actually supported the novel (not really) idea of evaluation software. Instead of Apple allowing evaluation periods, they decided to go with “Lite Apps” (there’s actually a section in the Apple Developer Center that recommends releasing a Lite app, with stripped out functionality). There have been countless times that I have been partially interested in an iPhone App only to find that is not free and the “Lite” version doesn’t allow me to actually test what I want to. Some developers, like Remember the Milk, have gone about their own methods of providing a trial period enforced by a web-service.

Fourth, there’s battery life.

Jobs claims that on an iPhone, an H.264-encoded video will play up to 10 hours whereas a software-decoded video will play only up to 5 hours. This may well be true, but I don’t think Apple is in any position to preach about battery life. I have had to charge my iPhone, without fail, every night. If I don’t, I’ll get into the red midway through the next day. I don’t make that many calls, either (if I could exchange my rollover balance for cash value, I’d be a rich man), so it’s not like I’m using my phone all that much. In fact, I check in to Twitter about 3-4 times a day, the same with Facebook and occasionally I play Racing Live for about 5 minutes (this is not a graphics-intensive game, btw, it is more of a “simulation”-type game). Yet, my battery is toasted by the time I reach home. I can’t imagine how life is going to be when multi-tasking is supported.

I guess Apple does have a claim to make here, they’re prepared to do anything if it increases battery life.

Fifth, there’s Touch.

A side-note, I wonder if Apple has actually trademarked the word “Touch”. Why else would it appear capitalized? Anyhow, Jobs’ claim here is that Flash was designed for mouse-based input whereas the iPhone OS introduces a completely new touch-based interface. The point is well-taken. I’m not aware if Adobe has made any forays into touch input, but my feeling is they would have, if they were expecting to release the Flash CS5 Deploy to iPhone App feature. Which leads nicely into Jobs’ final point, the most important one, supposedly.

Sixth, the most important reason.

Besides the fact that Flash is closed and proprietary, has major technical drawbacks, and doesn’t support touch based devices, there is an even more important reason we do not allow Flash on iPhones, iPods and iPads. We have discussed the downsides of using Flash to play video and interactive content from websites, but Adobe also wants developers to adopt Flash to create apps that run on our mobile devices.

This is referring to the Deploy to iPhone App feature that I talked about in the previous point. Basically, Adobe is planning to release, in Flash CS5, the ability for a user to deploy a Flash animation as an iPhone App. Flash does all the heavy-lifting of converting the ActionScript code into the archaic Objective C format, compiling it as required by the App Store, etc. However, a few weeks ago, Apple modified their developer contract to state that creators of iPhone Apps must have originally created that code in Objective C. This basically makes any app that was generated by Flash CS5 in violation of the developer agreement. The same is the case for apps developed using MonoTouch–the commercially available tool that allows .NET developers on Macs to create iPhone Apps–as they are also not originally Objective C.

Jobs then goes as far as to suggest that developers won’t have access to the newest features when they become available, etc. I have a huge pain-point with this. In my previous discussions about Apple and it’s products, I always bow out of the discussion when someone brings up the point that Apple is not targeted primarily towards technical consumers. What this means is that I can go and build a computer for less than it costs to buy a Mac–that’s why Macs aren’t targeted towards me, specifically. I can understand and accept that–Apple does a good job in marketing a product and keeping their profit margins wide. However, Jobs, in this case, actually is trying to run the same argument by, except targeting them towards the actual technical users.

He hypothesizes that if Apple were to allow third-party code to be converted into Objective C, developers would become clueless about how to take advantage of the newest features released in an Apple SDK. That’s not only extremely inaccurate, but it is extremely insulting to many parties.

It is insulting to developers because we have to be ahead of the technology curve (for example, the iPhone OS 4 SDK is already out for iPhone developers, but not for end users) and have to have an understanding of how a system actually works.

It is insulting to consumers because it suggests that they will not be able to tell the difference between a good app and a bad app. As I’ve said earlier, it is a fallacy that all apps created within the Apple-permitted spectrum are good and all apps created outside that spectrum are bad. Why not let the user decide what is a good app?

Finally, it is insulting to the actual Apple staff involved in the app review committee. Jobs is basically suggesting that they will not be able to adequately test an application to determine whether it is good or bad, without knowing if it was originally Objective C or not. This basically throws hot water on the whole app review process, because it claims that the process will not be able to test an app’s usability independent of the development platform.

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As a whole, I understand why Steve Jobs does not want Flash on the iPhone OS and I have no problems with it. I’m not a major Flash proponent and there are only a handful of websites I visit on an iPhone anyway. I would have a problem with it if I owned an iPad, but that, and several other reasons, have contributed to me not being even a bit interested in owning one. I do have issues with the lock-down of the development process, though, for no reason whatsoever. iPhone developers still have to purchase a Mac to develop their software on, because iPhone apps use a bunch of frameworks that don’t have cross-platform ports. So it is not as if Apple is losing a revenue stream there. It is not as if Apple is losing the developer account revenue stream either–since the developers of those apps would still have to pay their annual fee to be able to sell on the App Store.

On the whole, that move by Apple just seems like a reaction without provocation.

Eastern Conference

Cleveland (1) vs. Chicago (8) — Cleveland leads 1-0

This one’s a no-brainer for me. The Cavs have far too much offense for the Bulls to be anything more than a blip on their radar. This showed in Game 1, where Derrick Rose was the only guy who could really put up points for the Bulls, and even he scored 28 points off 28 shot attempts. The Bulls will need Hinrich to score to cause any upsets in this series. Personally, I want to see the Cavaliers win because I think a Kobe vs. LeBron final would be interesting.

PREDICTION: Cavaliers 4-0

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Orlando (2) vs. Charlotte (7) — Orlando leads 1-0

Again, this seems to be a competition between high-powered versus low-octane offense. In Game 1, Orlando got off to a huge lead before Charlotte clawed back. The Magic hung on for the win, however. I’m pretty neutral about this match-up–I don’t care for either team. Charlotte is a mix between young, inexperienced players (like Gerald Wallace) and veterans (like Stephen Jackson). Jackson sat out a portion of the game due to injury, though, so it’s probably going to be a Magic roll. I’ll go ahead and give the Bobcats a game, but that is a very optimistic prediction.

PREDICTION: Orlando 4-1

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Atlanta (3) vs. Milwaukee (6) — Atlanta leads 1-0

This is a match-up that I think could get really close, especially if Brandon Jennings gets some help from his team. Both these teams are young and inexperienced, relatively speaking. If Andrew Bogut wasn’t injured, I wouldn’t be surprised if this went down to 7 games. Atlanta has secured their highest playoff seed in the last few seasons (right?) so they can consider themselves a tad unlucky for drawing a relatively hot Bucks team. I think the Hawks will hang on, though. I’m supporting them.

PREDICTION: Atlanta 4-2

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Boston (4) vs. Miami (5) — Boston leads 1-0

The 4-5 match-up is always the one most likely to throw up an upset, but it seems Miami’s offense has been a bit stagnant of late. This is probably going to be a pretty low-scoring series, with an emphasis on defense. Ray Allen continued to struggle in Game 1 as the Celtics hung on to a scrappy victory. D-Wade was sublime and questionable in equal measures in the first game. For example, I couldn’t understand why he picked up his dribble outside the three point line over and over again in the 4th quarter whereas he had been getting to the hoop at will in the previous 3 periods. With Garnett’s suspension, Miami has a chance to steal one on the road. I want to see this series go down to 7 and for Miami to win, but I think Boston will hold on–as they’ve managed to in the last couple of seasons.

PREDICTION: Boston 4-2

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Now for the conference that matters… the Western Conference.

Western Conference

L.A. Lakers (1) vs. Oklahoma City (8) — Lakers lead 1-0

OkC would be disappointed with falling to the 8th seed in the West after having such a strong season and drawing a match-up with the Lakers. Luckily for them, the Lakers have been in questionable form for the last month or so. In their first playoff appearance, the Thunder, led by Kevin Durant, seemed overawed by the occasion. KD never really got going and the Thunder followed suit. They pulled close to the Lakers a couple of time, but even with Bryant shooting horribly, weren’t able to pull out the rare win in Lakerland. The Lakers will benefit mightily from having Bynum back and Odom will bolster up a very shallow and weak bench. If a Laker starter gets injured over the course of this series, I think the Thunder may get close, but as it stands, I think L.A.’s post presence is going to be enough to pull off the win. I’ll give the Thunder 1 win at home. I’m supporting the Lakers in this one.

PREDICTION: Los Angeles 4-1

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Dallas (2) vs. San Antonio (7) — Mavericks lead 1-0

The Spurs are playing with their worst playoff seed since the 90′s or something like that. With many of their key players injured this season, I suppose they’ll take a low playoff spot rather than none. In Game 1, the game stayed tight for a long time but the Mavericks managed to hold on. Dirk Nowitzki was nearly perfect, yesterday, missing just 3 shots from the field and making all his free throws. Caron Butler provided a spark that was much-needed given Jason Terry’s lackluster performance off the bench (though Terry did nail some clutch jumpers at the end). The Mavericks have had a propensity to choke in the playoffs, though. Parker is still working his way into the rotation (he’s lost his starting job to Ginobili) and Duncan is still consistent but not phenomenal. I’m going to predict an upset here and say San Antonio will win in 7. I hope to hell that I’m wrong because there isn’t a team I despise more than the Spurs.

PREDICTION: San Antonio 4-3

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Phoenix (3) vs. Portland (6) — Blazers lead 1-0

Phoenix were the only home team to lose on opening weekend and hence squandered their homecourt advantage to the perennially-injured Trail Blazers. With Brandon Roy recovering from injury for at least 2 weeks, the Suns were probably expecting a first round walkover. The Blazers have learned to play without their best players throughout the season, though, going through a bizarre sequence of injuries that affected everyone from Greg Oden to Pryzbilla to Aldridge to Roy over the regular season. They managed to get healthy to secure up a playoff spot, but lost Roy almost immediately. Andre Miller has played some inspired basketball of late, and the Blazers have snapped up the homecourt advantage to set up an intriguing contest. I’m supporting Phoenix in this match-up and I think Nash and Amare will eventually be able to get the away game back. In fact, unless Roy returns earlier than scheduled, I think the Suns will win with a game to spare.

PREDICTION: Phoenix 4-2

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Denver (4) vs. Utah (5) — Nuggets lead 1-0

Denver would be disappointed at falling down to the fourth seed and possibly meeting the Lakers as early as the 2nd round. However, they’ve got to concentrate on the series at hand. Unfortunately for the Jazz, it looks like they’ve been hit by the injury bug at the worst possible time. Their offense has been severely dented by the loss of Kirilenko leading into the playoffs and now Okur, whose out of the rest of the postseason following Game 1. Boozer is not at 100% either, so that puts the burden of offense squarely on the shoulders of Deron Williams, with some help from the likes of Korver and Brewer. The Nuggets looked pretty strong on Saturday night, with Carmelo looking in great rhythm. I actually think that the Nuggs will take this series pretty easily. If the Jazz had been a bit healthier, my money was on them causing the upset, but this is just too many chips to overcome.

PREDICTION: Nuggets 4-1