Bucks Buzz: Monday March 10th

Even though it has been a bad year for Milwaukee thus far, Mitch Pratt and Charlie Tritschler will provide you with a bi-weekly update on the Bucks ranging from recaps, links and other neat stuff.  

Hot Recap Takes

Thursday: Pelicans 112 Bucks 104  -  Spirted effort from Milwaukee's professional basketball team. They played the Pellies tough throughout the whole four quarters, but they could not get it done down in the Nola. A trend continued on Friday when Anthony Davis took Bucks' big man to the absolute woodshed with a 29 point, 14 rebound performance along with five assists and a couple blocks. He took full control inside plus they got a great game from Tyreke Evans with 25 points. Milwaukee got another great game from Jeff Adrien whom matched his career-high from the night before by having 20 points and 10 rebounds in a losing effort. Adrien is playing at such a high level right now, which now means he will get overpaid by this franchise. John Henson deserves some love too as he started for Ersan Ilyasova and had 12 points with six rebounds, one of his better performances of late. O.J. Mayo decided he did not need to play this one after shoving former Wisconsin Badger Greg Stiemsma in the throat/face area which got him ejected

Saturday: Wizards 114 Bucks 107 - If Milwaukee would have came to play in the first half, this might have been a different game. They gave up 75 points digging a 22 point hole at the break. Milwaukee came back from half to hold Washington to only 10 points in the third quarter, but could not complete the comeback getting their 50th loss of the season. Trevor Ariza continued his hot stretch of late having 28 points with five threes including seven rebounds. Additionally, Washington got five more threes from Bradley Beal as he dropped 23 points. If John Wall beats you, that's okay, but to have the other players take you down is a little disappointing. As for Milwaukee, their backcourt had a nice game with Brandon Knight filling it up with 25 points on 9/20 shooting with Nasty Nate Wolters adding 10 points of his own along with a positive PER.

Bucks and Fox Sports Wisconsin, how can it be fixed?
As some Bucks fans learned on Saturday night, the game was not on television. This disappointed a lot of people including yours truly as it would have been fun to see Milwaukee take on the Wizards, one of the best young teams in basketball.  I do not understand why they chose home games to get the ax. I could totally get them not wanting to bring their cameras to New Orleans as that matchup does not really drive up the needle, but for whatever reason, they felt Saturday's game was less important than Friday. There needs to be a better plan in place for this sort of things. Look at some of the perceived worst teams, and when Milwaukee visits them, give them the ax. I realize we are not getting 82 games of Bucks basketball because that's how it works with FOX Sports, but let's try to figure out a better balance with these games.  

Links
Journal Sentinel had a nice write up about Henson's struggles in his second year. I met John on Saturday afternoon as we were at the same event. Good dude honesty. Down to earth guy who does not think he is better than anyone else.

Nice look from the people of Bucksetball looking at the Gary Neal trade after about a month later. Ramon Sessions and Adrien have been special.

What to watch
I would look for the Bucks durability. This sort of runs into the schedule, but the Bucks play five games in seven days. Luckily for Milwaukee, everyone is off suspension and healthy.

Upcoming schedule
They play Orlando tonight, a team they have beaten this year and then they travel to Minnesota on Tuesday night. Bucks could get one of two here. Doubt they would take both of them.

Charlie.

NFL's Thursday Night Football Choice & NFL Saturdays Return!

There is a complete thirst for football 24/7. Look on Twitter today, people are clamoring over National
Signing Day with people freaking out about Alabama's recruiting class. It is like a lifeblood for people no matter if it is college or professional football. Despite having its highest ratings last year, the NFL wanted more people to watch Thursday night games and every major network put a bid in. CBS came out on top and this whole thing has many different lanes with many things that could happen with this new Thursday night package.

CBS announces the number one team, Jim Nantz and Phil Simms, will get the Thursday night package meaning they decide not to vault another broadcast team. With CBS in somewhat flux with their broadcast team as Dan Dierdorf retired and I believe Greg Gumbel will stay yet many people are pushing for Ian Eagle and Dan Fouts to become the new number two team at CBS. While Gumbel gets a great deal of respect, 'The Bird and The Beard' as they are known as fan favorites. It would have been cool to see CBS give Eagle and Fouts the Thursday night gig yet I understand their decision to go with Nantz and Simms. This is a big moment for NFL on CBS' brand, and they want their head team in charge of it.

NFL Network will get six Thursday night games later in the season as well as two Saturday games in Week 16. They will get to simulcast the CBS games as well as using their pregame, halftime and post game hosts as well as their sideline reporters. It will basically be the NFL Network's game with some added CBS elements. This is a great opportunity for NFL Network to get creative with their simulcast. ESPN did this with their National Championship coverage where they had a bar setting, natural sound, using radio calls of the teams and watching the game from a different angle. All could be in play for the NFL Network. I do not know if CBS will go along with this as it might divert eyes away from their network, but it is at least something to think about for them next year.

Another interesting aspect is what are the teams CBS will get for these games? It is unlikely all of these games will feature AFC teams meaning they might be able to get an extra NFC game meaning they could have San Francisco 49ers or Green Bay Packers on three times versus the usual two times of the season. Will the NFL allow a Packers-Minnesota Vikings matchup on CBS or will that not be allowed? This truly interests me which makes me a complete nerd, but FOX has to be upset with this development as theoretically, they could only have a team like Green Bay for only 11 or 12 games. CBS could pull a major coup over their competition.

The rebirth of the Saturday game is fantastic with a doubleheader where one will be played in late afternoon while the other is in primetime. Will anyone care this is the first Saturday of the college bowl season? Likely not. Usually this is when college basketball makes their voice known, will that matter? Nope, not one bit. This will also add element for fantasy football. This is the final week of fantasy meaning a championship could be decided as early as Saturday if you have a player like a Jamaal Charles going off for a big game. Additionally, this is a big help to the bars as people whom might not come out for a Sunday afternoon will definitely be there for a late-afternoon or primetime Saturday night game. Everybody wins with a day of Saturday football.

NFL will now win ratings likely on Thursday nights in primetime while helping CBS in the process even though they have Big Bang Theory which is near the top of primetime television on Thursdays. Now they can move it another day and continue to dominate the ratings throughout the week. This should be a fun experience for the 2014 season.

Charlie.

CBB Weekend Picks: Needing a FOX Sports Stream

As I settled in to watch Marquette take on Xavier, the Butler-DePaul game was still ongoing. I thought 'Well they will probably flip us to the other game, or we will just miss a little bit of the game.' The game happened to go two overtimes, and FOX Sports 1 where the MU-Xavier game was on alerted the audience it would go to FOX Sports 2, a channel normal digital Time Warner Cable customers do not get in their package. This would not be a problem if FOX Sports had a viable streaming option, but that is not the case. This is officially a problem for FOX Sports.

If they want to contend with ESPN like they say they do, FOX needs to have a respectable streaming option. They have FOX Sports Go, but as Awful Announcing points out, this is not really a legitimate choice right now.  WatchESPN is such an awesome tool. Every game is partially on there if it is on ESPN. Sometimes they do not show ESPNU games, but other than that, if it is on ESPN, you have it a stream of it. Even the major ABC events like the NBA Finals, were on WatchESPN this past summer. FOX does not have anything close to do that, and when they tried to do it for San Francisco-Green Bay which did not work out well. When it started ESPN3 had some major issues, but it did not take long for them to fix those issues. ESPN3 made sure I could watch Marquette games when I went to Eau Claire, it was vital.

The reason why this is a problem is more and more of the younger generation do not have cable. They have Roku, Apple TV, XBox 1, Playstation 4 are all options people are using instead of paying for cable. If FOX wants to appeal to the 18-30 demo (The same demo whom has some issues with ESPN lately, see Tebow, Tim), they need to at least have a streaming option. The fact they are the last ones in the group even if CBS and NBC Sports have some flaws, they still stream a ton of their important content. FOX needs seriously improvement in this category.

Games to watch
20. Iowa at 3. Ohio State (Played Sunday) 12:30 pm CBS - One team is coming off a loss, the other team gets their fiery head coach back. First time Iowa has been on national television since the Luke Recker days? As much as the guy irks me, Iowa does not really have an answer for Aaron Craft. I think he can get his hands all in this game plus they have enough big men to compete with the Hawkeyes. OSU 74-69

25. Kansas State at 18. Kansas 1:00 pm ESPN - Big game for Kansas. They picked up a nice road win against Oklahoma this week with the Jayhawks not getting much from Andrew Wiggins and Joel Embiid. That's important for Kansas to win without those guys doing much. Kansas State is a little undersized and they have only won at Lawrence twice in the last 20 years. I am taking Kansas by double digits. KU 79-63
 
North Carolina at 2. Syracuse 11:00 am ESPN - I honestly do not know what to hell to think about this one. Tar Heels have beaten these teams this year but losing to slums like Miami and Wake Forest. Orange have actually beat some teams this year unlike others where they feast on cupcakes. Syracuse's zone is not as good as its been in years past yet North Carolina is going to force so many bad shots in this game. Orange pulls away in the last couple minutes of the game. CUSE 71-62

15. Colorado at Washington (Played Sunday) 2:00 pm FOX Sports 1 - This is my upset special of the weekend. Washington has six losses already meaning they need a win. Huskies pushed Arizona on the road last week, and this is their first big home opponent. Lock it up, Washington. UW 65-62

Minnesota at 3. Michigan State 1:15 pm Big Ten Network - I do not know if this will be close, but Golden Gophers start a stretch that is Sparty, Ohio State, Iowa and Wisconsin, all ranked three in the top ten. Best of luck Goldy. MSU 75-59

Charlie.