The Talk At The Bus Stop

[Brad Palmer]

My friend emailed me this and I had to post it:

I was at the bus stop lamenting the game and the season with a neighbor, and another guy, who’s not a college basketball fan, said “I can’t believe you guys are so upset and ripping the team – do you expect to win the championship every year?” The casual fan doesn’t get it. It’s not that they lost and had a mediocre season. I could live with this year if their roster was decimated after the title. Fact is they lost Kemba (albeit a great player), but they returned everyone else of note including a 1st team pre-season all-american (Lamb), a second team all-Big East (Oriahki), a first-team all-rookie player (Boatright) along with 4 others who played significant minutes last year (Napier, Roscoe, Olander, Giffey) who you thought were going to get better. On top of that, they added the best high school player in the country (Drummond) and two top 50 high school players (Boatright and Daniels).

What makes this team so frustrating is that of the 9 players who played, not one exceeded expectations which is very unusual for a Calhoun team. In fact, I would say only Boatright played up to what was expected. The other 8 were disappointments. If there was a “most disappointing player award” given nationally, the top 2 contenders would be Oriahki and Drummond.

 

[TRest]

Needs more bus-stop details.

 

[Fishy]

Can someone weigh in with the mood of the train stations?

I'm heading to the airport to get the pulse of the crowd there.

 

[Rico444]

If only one out of nine players failed to meet expectations, did you ever think maybe the problem is the expectations themselves were too great?

 

[August_West]

People were pissed at the hiking trails this morning


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[8893]

Reporting on the scene from the water cooler in the office. I spilled some water while filling my cup. I think my hand was shaking a little. Still a little overtired and hung over from my consolation beer(s).

 

[jorge34]

In the crapper at work, the talk centered around failed expectations

 

[The Funster]

The young chick at DD dropped someone's bagel as it came out of the toaster. As one, we all snarled, " Drummond" and then she cried.

 

[Vuce]

In the crapper at work, the talk centered around failed expectations

The failed expectations of the Uconn team or what was going on in the men's room?

 

[TheRogers]

My friend emailed me this and I had to post it:

I was at the bus stop lamenting the game and the season with a neighbor, and another guy, who’s not a college basketball fan, said “I can’t believe you guys are so upset and ripping the team – do you expect to win the championship every year?” The casual fan doesn’t get it. It’s not that they lost and had a mediocre season. I could live with this year if their roster was decimated after the title. Fact is they lost Kemba (albeit a great player), but they returned everyone else of note including a 1st team pre-season all-american (Lamb), a second team all-Big East (Oriahki), a first-team all-rookie player (Boatright) along with 4 others who played significant minutes last year (Napier, Roscoe, Olander, Giffey) who you thought were going to get better. On top of that, they added the best high school player in the country (Drummond) and two top 50 high school players (Boatright and Daniels).

What makes this team so frustrating is that of the 9 players who played, not one exceeded expectations which is very unusual for a Calhoun team. In fact, I would say only Boatright played up to what was expected. The other 8 were disappointments. If there was a “most disappointing player award” given nationally, the top 2 contenders would be Oriahki and Drummond.

Any chance your friend lives in Oregon? If so were there cheerleaders around?

YEEEAAAAAAAAHHHHHH! What a segway. Jleves, do your magic!

 

[upstater]

Drummond and Napier exceeded my expectations. Roscoe was Roscoe, but I hold out the hope his shooting will improve immensely.

 

[Fishy]

I've set up a traffic stop in the HOV lane to interview commuters.

They seem angry at me, but I can tell that it's really the rebounding imbalance that's gotten under their skin. There are tinges of disappointment in the perimeter D as well out here on the highways.

 

[brasssbonanzaa]

I think the more direct response to the original poster's quote from the guy at the bus stop is this, to most programs, you get your day in the sun and then it's, OK, we had our fun, now it's time for someone else, I'm satisfied with that for now. The standard for our program is higher. It's obviously unrealistic to expect a title every year, but the standard for our program, and the benchmark by which we judge success is a national championship, not making it there once and being satisfied.

 

[Dogdeacon]

At the Starbucks I believe frustrated patrons were resorting to italian expletives in reaction to the UConn loss. Overheard;
"A Grande Flopochino"
"A Venti lat down"
"tall skinny dull"

 

[upstater]

Standards are way too high then. I was looking for a sweet 16 run for this team, and then I saw the bracket.

 

[tykurez]

The young chick at DD dropped someone's bagel as it came out of the toaster. As one, we all snarled, " Drummond" and then she cried.

This deserves a "that was funny" post. Good stuff.

 

[Silk City]

I just talked to one of Fab Melo's teachers about it, she said she would grade UConn's performance this season a B+.

Wow, he must be dumb.

 

[brasssbonanzaa]

Standards are way too high then. I was looking for a sweet 16 run for this team, and then I saw the bracket.

Standards for a program and standards for an individual team are different things. I'm talking about the standards for the UConn basketball program. This team obviously didn't live up to those standards this season, after meeting and exceeding them last season. Again, it's not realistic to expect a championship every year, but we're also not a program that's going to say well, all right, we had a great run in 2011, no worries that we sucked this year. That's the mentality of a losing program with no desire and no hunger to continue achieving at the highest level.

 

[partial]

I know I'm late responding to this thread, but couldn't get to my office on time this morning. First, some guy accosted me at the bus stop arguing about the game, and I missed my bus. Then some crazy guy had blocked off the HOV line, he was big too(6'6" ~250) had an I'm with stupid shirt(the arrow pointing to his pants) and he was wearing one of those #1 foam fingers. Just ranting and raving something about the mayan Apocalypse, 2012, UConn, and Drummond not going up strong.

 

[jibsey]

it's pretty quiet at the polo club, just me and Mitt........

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

Not a peep about last night in the yoga class; it was like nobody had watched the game. Spooky.

 

[UCHuskies08]

My friend emailed me this and I had to post it:

I was at the bus stop lamenting the game and the season with a neighbor, and another guy, who’s not a college basketball fan, said “I can’t believe you guys are so upset and ripping the team – do you expect to win the championship every year?” The casual fan doesn’t get it. It’s not that they lost and had a mediocre season. I could live with this year if their roster was decimated after the title. Fact is they lost Kemba (albeit a great player), but they returned everyone else of note including a 1st team pre-season all-american (Lamb), a second team all-Big East (Oriahki), a first-team all-rookie player (Boatright) along with 4 others who played significant minutes last year (Napier, Roscoe, Olander, Giffey) who you thought were going to get better. On top of that, they added the best high school player in the country (Drummond) and two top 50 high school players (Boatright and Daniels).

What makes this team so frustrating is that of the 9 players who played, not one exceeded expectations which is very unusual for a Calhoun team. In fact, I would say only Boatright played up to what was expected. The other 8 were disappointments. If there was a “most disappointing player award” given nationally, the top 2 contenders would be Oriahki and Drummond.

I completely agree with the guy at the bus stop.

People should stop complaining and get a duck*ing grip. Your buddy can start.

 

[sledog]

I tried to allieve it all with a 20 #er that would make Thomas Crapper proud, but no luck. Failure was prevalent today. Can't wait for tomorrow to try it again. Ah, the world in micro.