Big Bux, Young Bucks, and Old Buck

This entry comes in a bit late because I was spending way too much time playing online poker tonight. After enduring a two week long losing streak, I finally had a breakthrough session where I was combining good play with good luck, and I found myself actually collecting chips rather than giving them away. Unfortunately, my winning ways returned just one day (and about $349.999 million) short of being able to put in a bid to compete with Clay Bennett to purchase the Seattle Supersonics (Bennett can have the Storm tho). Even if the city wouldn't build a new state-of-the-art stadium, I would have promised to keep the Sonics in Seattle in exchange for standing reservations at Chiso with free sake bombs. Bennett has said that he will make a good faith effort to keep the team in Seattle, however judging by this or this article, it's safe to assume that there's a fair amount of skepticism. If you're a diehard Sonics fan, it appears that sooner or later, if you want to see your team in person, you'll have to fly out to Oklahoma City. I hear the arena is nice, but I'd be wary about ordering any fries while you're there. It looks like the future for Seattle basketball is looking as cloudy as.....well, as cloudy as everything else is in Seattle.

The future is looking much brighter (look at that seamless segue!) for Major League Baseball as the night was filled with standout performances from rookie pitchers. Francisco Liriano went 8 2/3 innings without allowing an earned run, Chad Billingsley pitched 7 scoreless innings in route to his first MLB win, and Jon Lester and Jon Papelbon combined on a one hit shutout of the Kansas City Royals. This is looking like the beginning of a great new era for baseball with every team having a stud young prospect to be excited about for years to come. Well, every team except the one that has "Giants" sewn on its jersey. But at least Giants fans have the benefit of getting extra value out of every ticket they buy since each home game is both a big league game and an old-timers game in one.

Somehow the Giants did miss out on signing one other old-timer who would have fit in well on their roster. The Kansas City T-Bones and Buck O'Neil agreed to a one day contract in order to allow the 94 year-old to play in the Northern League All-Star game. O'Neil had two plate appearances, both resulting in walks. Prior to the game, O'Neil speculated that he "might take a swing at one." Perhaps he thought Jose Canseco was going to be the opposing pitcher.