We're Baaaaaack (Theoretically)

Sorry for the Olympic hangover, but now that baseball is gone and basketball is back, so are we (back, not gone... for now).

Not that any of you care, but here is what I have been occupied with:

Moving back into school.

Getting addicted to gambling on sports.

Losing my bankroll by gambling on sports.

Getting addicted to online poker.

Exams/Homework? (Not that time-consuming)

Being surprisingly good at online poker (I make more in poker than at my job, which is both great and sad).

Drafting probably the worst fantasy basketball team in history in the U&M Fantasy Basketball Classic

"Loren's underground. And something tells me that he's not only down with that, but that he embraces it. Power to you, Loren, and stick it to the man.

-Rob Mahoney, Upside and Motor

What that basically means is that no one has ever heard of me. I guess I embrace it, but that's not to say that I would turn down exposure. But with great power comes great responsibility and the inability to go on season-long breaks.

Um, what's going on with my targeted ads?

[edit] Am I being punked?

Year In Review

In celebration of PP's birthday, here's a brief-ish list of what I would consider the best posts in the history of the site, in the order that they were published. After each link, I'll try to offer up a brief analysis of my reaction after re-reading the post. I'm going to assume that no one reading this right now except for Alex is very familiar at all with my earlier work, when I was toiling away in the land of 3 hits per day.

The Trials and Tribulations of Yi Jianlian: In which I watch a couple summer league games and try to make coherent deductions from them. I have since learned that this type of analysis is very very flawed. However, I stick by my defense of most of the criticisms against Yi and revisit them here.

Andrew and the Bling: In which I respond to Andrew Bogut's contention that NBA players are basically really dumb. However, looking back on this I since have changed my opinion about the lasting wealth of NBA players, and hope to go into that in more detail later.

756*: In which I become the devil's advocate and make an argument in support of steroids. I've never been a "fan" of steroids by any means, but I think in writing this post, I thought the reasons for which they were stigmatized were faulty. Also, this marks date that I coined the name, Barold Lamarcus Bonds (this isn't his real name).

Blogger Ethics: Part 1 and 2: In which I call out Leitch and then subsequently back off my comments. I still am not entirely sure of how I feel about the issue, but I will back one point I made in Part 1, when I said that bloggers were not journalists. I've seen the work of countless bloggers since I made that comment (January) that go above and beyond what I'd expect from "journalists".

One word: Socks: In which I make the claim that Gerald Green deserved it the Dunk Contest than Dwight Howard. I stand by everything that I said here. I still don't understand the appeal of the Superman dunk. I mean we all claim to want originality, but every gives a 50 to the most over-produced dunk contest slam ever. I mean come on, Brent Barry dunked from farther away.

Note that the concentration of what I consider my best posts has significantly diminished over time. Do I think that I was a better blogger then than I am now? Probably not, but there were several philosophical changes I made, the foremost being the decision not to write 10,000 word posts anymore.

Happy Birthday

Today marks the one year anniversary of the day that I aptly decided to start a sports blog during the week that sports forgot. I do believe that celebrations are in order.

Find us on facebook

Everyone reading this right now with a facebook account should hop on over and join our blog network, because Alex, Corn and I are lonely right now. If nothing else, if you could confirm me as the author of the blog so that I can do awesome things like add new authors (Reptar, Stro and Sara deserve their recognition too!), that would be awesome.

While you're at it, here's a list of the most read basketblogs on Facebook. I can't say that I've heard of most of these.

Mission statement

Photo by Flickr user Radiospike Photography used under a Creative Commons license.
As the blog grows in popularity, I feel like I should make a note about the ideology of our site. I think it's important for smaller (Read: non-Deadspin, Fanhaus) sports blogs to have a certain personality that typifies the type of athletes, plays and even sports they like.

Everybody knows what it is to be "Free Darko". We know the philosophies of Basketbawful and FIRE JOE MORGAN and Awful Announcing. We even have an idea of what to expect from Babes Love Baseball and Hardwood Paroxysm.

So what does Pure Point stand for?

Well, first of all, Pure Point is sort of a misnomer, because we clearly aren't exemplified by the John Stockton's of the world. To explain what it means to be "Pure Point" (as an adjective, not a noun), let me break it down for you.

First, there's the Pure. Pure, pristine, unadulterated, virgin, untouched.

We are the beauty of the unseen. We are the possibilities of the unknown.

We are the draft more than the playoffs. We are Tremendous Upside Potential.

We are the stars the media forgot. We are the ones that they haven't seen yet.

We are Shaun Livingston, Gerald Green and Gael Monfils. Justin Upton, Billy Butler, and Scoville Jenkins.

We are almost everyone on the Oakland A's.

We are Chase Budinger playing volleyball. We are the 2005 Portland Sea Dogs.

We are Slamball, Net Ball, Push Ball, and Takraw.

We are the naturals. We are the Pure.

And then there's the Point.

We like things to have a purpose, a role, an identifiable responsibility that can be clearly seen and pointed out.

We like pure points (coincidentally), speed demons, big boppers, Three Outcomes, garbage men, and spot-up shooters.

We like Chuck Hayes, Rajon Rondo, Petteri Kopponen, Jared Jordan, Jason Kapono, Anderson Varejao, Ronny Turiaf and J.J. Redick.

We like Michael Bourn, Carlos Gomez, Ichiro, Adam Dunn and Jack Cust.

We like pretty much all set-up men.

We like Shaun Livingston, Shaun Livingston, Shaun Livingston.

We like teams that are a well-functioning machine of separate parts rather than a hodgepodge of combo guys and do-it-alls.

We like things to have a Point.

And there you have it. Now you know what it means to be "Pure Point".

[This is one of the least Pure Point posts we've ever written.]

Update your feed readers

The Feed for this site has been moved to

http://feeds.feedburner.com/PurePoint

Wow, I'm so 2.0.

A Less Than Triumphant Return

Now that I have returned to the working world, it seems apt that I return to the blogosphere as well.

However, rather than jump in in the middle of the NBA Playoffs, I've decided to hold off a little bit on my NBA blogging. You'll see tidbits of MLB coverage and maybe a smattering of Roland Garros here and there as I pretend to be a panathletic writer, but the real return of NBA writing won't come until the draft combines and then in full force with my annual liveblogging of the NBA Draft, which is in my opinion, the most exciting day of the year.

In the meantime...

1. Read this Ziller piece about combo guards.
2. Pre-order the Free Darko book.
3. Check out everything on The X's and O's of Basketball.
4. Wonder why you never thought of being a mechaphiliac.

So basically....I'm awesome

Okay, so I decided that my first post should be a little bit of an introduction. You might be thinking, 'Well, I know a bit about what Loren is like, so Sara is probably similar since she's going out with him,' or perhaps, 'Sara probably knows a few things about sports since this is a sports blog.' First of all, while Loren is a quiet, rather reserved, Christian Republican who's rather mathy, I am a quite loud, very talkative, Jewish Democrat who drunkenly fights people. Also, my sports knowledge is very limited. To be honest, I'm really only writing on this blog since Loren felt bad for rejecting my weekend-editor application and I made sure to let him know how awesome I would be and actually post things. Since I know close to nothing about sports, my posts will be about non-sports topics that are still related to sports. I know you're all probably just dying to find out what I'll be posting about, but you'll just have to wait.

[Editor's Note] You'll also come to know Sara (assuming she ever posts again) as a lover of run-on sentences and faulty conclusions ("I know a bit about what Loren is like." I doubt many of my readers know anything about what I am like other than that I somewhat like sports). I'm tempted to censor some revelations in my character, preferring to remain slightly more detached from my readership, but I guess I don't really care. I figure I'm going to have to edit a good majority of her posts though.

Computers hate me

Sorry for the lack of posts yet again. My computer decided to die on me (again). Luckily, this time it was still under warranty and I will be getting a new one tonight and you all can get back to looking at more pretty pictures (Google Image Search probably accounts for 2/3 of the traffic on this site).

Blogger Ethics 2: The Other Side

When I started writing yesterday's post about the Leitch-Cuban saga, I was not exactly sure whose side I would end up on in the end. Though it may seem like I am villainizing Leitch, and I admit I may have been harsh, in reality I was torn about the issue and looking for views nd feedback from the community. And oh did I get it. While J-Red's comment in support of Leitch is the only one available to the public at this point, I did get some views on both sides in private (the anonymity of which will not be compromised).

To show that I really am not sure of my opinion on the matter, I will write a similarly scathing post for the other side of the discussion, in true debater form.

In terms of journalistic integrity, I would agree wholeheartedly with J-Red. I remember reading someting Rick Reilly wrote maybe a year ago when he said, "If somebody says, 'This is off the record, not even without attribution,' then I usually say, 'Then don't tell me. Because I might get it later from somebody else and you'll think I ratfinked on you.' That makes life simpler."

In essence this is J-Red's point exactly. If you say something to a reporter, you should expect it to be published.

There is no reason why this shouldn't be the same for a blogger, and rather possibly should be more of the case. Nothing is off the record for us because blogs, often defined as public conversations or diaries, are often just musings.

For argument's sake, let's consider Will Leitch, the GQ columnist, and Will Leitch, the blogger, as separate people. The GQ columnist was sent on an assignment to conduct a face-to-face interview with Mark Cuban. He completes his assignment completely professionally and even tells Cuban about his alter-ego, the blogger, the existence of which did not stop Cuban from giving the interview. Meanwhile, the blogger is listening to the interview, picking up on interesting tidbits to include in his blog.

The post in question does not contain any information that would be only available to the GQ reporter, only a quote from Cuban that was published in the article. Otherwise, it seemed to be just another opinion piece about Cuban that happened to be written by someone who interviewed him a while earlier. If the post were written by someone else, taking away the lead-in, which only serves to introduce the subject, there would be no discussion. So what is the problem here exactly? In other words, what does Mark Cuban want the statute of limitations for this to be (how long before Will Leitch is allowed to blog anything about Cuban again)? One month? Six months? Forever?

Cuban's attempted purchase of the Cubs is a major issue in sports right now (well, maybe it's just a little more than an afterthought), and Leitch's interview with him provided an appropriate stimulus for a post. Not making that post would be ignoring his duty as a blogger, which is to imbibe us, the readership, with all the information and analysis that he has, which the MSM either does not want to or just does not give us. This is not a question of ethics, simply of responsibility.

Blogger Ethics

Mark Cuban, the oft outspoken owner of the Dallas Mavericks, wrote a post today stating that he gave an interview for a journalist to put in a magazine, but that journalist, who has a second life as a sports blogger decided to turn that around and write a blog post about it as well.

The question he raised is one of ethics. Was it right for the blogger in question (in this case, a certain Will Leitch) to basically obtain an interview with a prominent figure under false pretenses? The post he wrote was not by any means laudatory, and maybe that's why Cuban had a problem with it, but nevertheless, he agreed to an interview with GQ, not with Valleywag (the sister site of DeadSpin).

A point to be made here is that if there is one thing that bloggers are not, it's journalists. This is the information age and bloggers are capable about opining about basically everything that the national media conglomerates wouldn't touch. We are the heralded party here, especially within our little circle. That does not mean however, that we do not have rules.

McD made a post yesterday about morals: how bloggers have them and journalists often do not. While Leitch's post may not have necessarily been a personal attack on Cuban, which is what McD was speaking out against, but it does show a certain lack of integrity.

If there's one thing that all of us bloggers can come together about is that we want mainstream media to take us more seriously. It hurts when Stephen A. Smith says that bloggers shouldn't be allowed an audience, because we, as writers, know how much time and effort is spent on making our respective sites as reputable as possible. As of right now, we are definitely gaining ground with more and more sponsored sites (ESPN's Truehoop and AOL Fanhouse come to mind) popping up. If that's ever going to happen entirely, we need to change the image of the prototypical blogger (loser in his parent's basement), and swindling an interview is not how to go about doing that.

Athletic and Trendy?

In case you weren't satisfied by your Chanel Football, Fashion Designer Takashi Murakami introduces us to a new high (Courtesy of the Pure Point Gal).


We all know that to the rest of the world, soccer is the real football. We also know that it's probably a lot cooler to be European (or in this case, Japanese) than American right now. So imagine how awesome you'd look if seen kicking this $400 bad boy around Rodeo Drive in your new... this is as far as my haute couture knowledge goes...

That's why I'm officially introducing Sara, better known as the Pure Point Gal, as the site's new Non-Sports Editor to give weekly (hopefully, we all have seen what weekly seems to mean on this blog, sorry Stro and Coop) updates on the world of sports outside of sports. Hopefully this will help attract a new audience to the site (Babes? Ladies...?), or actually just about anyone at all.

Un-hiated

So I've been away from the blogging world for about a month and half right now because of finals and a 3 week trip to China with limited internet access and sports exposure, but hopefully I'll be back in action sometime during this coming week.

To the 2 or 3 of you that still reads this blog (possibly 0)... Thanks?

Should I be striking?

I guess it doesn't apply to sports bloggers, though.

No Power Rankings Today

Because I feel like it's overkill and even probably ill-conceived to make so many predictions based on the preseason. I wonder if anyone will miss it.

Accepted by BlogBurst

I'm not really sure what that implies for the site, other than the addition of another little button to the sidebar. Probably nothing.

Extended Leave

Sorry I haven't made a post in a long time. It's a long story, but can probably just be summarized by saying that I destroyed my computer and now do not have regular access to one until I get around to buying a new one. In the mean time, I hope you are getting acquainted to seeing posts from our new contributors, Coopstag, Singal, and Stro (who has yet to make a post, but should make a cameo soon). Hopefully I will be re-computerized after this weekend and after that I'll get back to satisfying your sports needs.

(It's a slow time in sports anyways, so whatever. Psh, no one likes football... that's what I have Singal for.)

Introducing...

Astute readers may have noticed that the "About Me" section on the sidebar has recently been changed to "Contributors." Over the course of the next week, you will get a chance to meet the new members of the Pure Point blog squad. Each new member will get their own introductory post in which they will say a couple things about what they hope to bring your way and how they want to make your stay at the Pure Point lounge more enjoyable.

Be nice to them and give them a warm welcome.

New Comment System

In an attempt to integrate trackbacks into my blog, I have ushered in a new comment system. I personally have mixed feelings about the comment system itself, but I do want the ability to enable trackbacks. Interface-wise, I think it works well on the post page, but is kind of annoying on the pop-up page. Leave your thoughts, though, feedback is always welcome.

There is a little poll on the sidebar so you can vote. I encourage everyone to do so.

[edit] After careful thought and some advice from people I know, I have decided to scrap the new comment system. I'll try to find a way to implement trackbacking in the future, but right now it is relatively unimportant.