Since we can’t get to everything that happens over the course of a single week in Denver sports, the weekend is a time to play catch-up with everything that might have gone under the radar. In honor of the peaks that dot our state’s landscape – and because there will be fourteen points per article – we’ll call it “The Weekend Fourteener.” Enjoy.
1. I’ve racked my brain for the last 24 hours trying to figure out why, exactly, the new Denver Broncos front office is looking to trade Jay Cutler, and I can’t come up with anything that makes sense. Three years in to his career, Cutler’s been to the Pro Bowl and appears to be on a career path that could place him with the elite QBs in the league by the time his prime hits. That’s not good enough for new GM Brian Xanders and coach Josh McDaniels, apparently, who were all set to ship him to Tampa Bay in a three-way deal that would have brought Matt Cassell to Denver. That deal fell through, but the message it sent couldn’t be clearer: Cutler isn’t a McDaniels type-of guy. Now, it depends on which source you’d like to believe, but the prevailing wisdom is that Cutler’s pissed and now wants to be traded. There’s no way to get around it: the relationship between the new coach and his best player has been damaged, perhaps irreparably, before minicamp can even begin. The prediction here is that, for the Broncos, this will get worse before it gets better.
2. Three free agent signings thus far for the Broncos, none of which inspires a great deal of confidence. Brian Dawkins is John Lynch redux: they might be able to squeeze another good year or two out of him, and he’s certainly an upgrade from the dreck the team had at safety last season, but fans expecting vintage ‘Hawk’ will be disappointed. The Donkeys also brought in two running backs, but there’s not a viable starting option among them. JJ Arrington will help the kick return game at least, but Arrington hasn’t looked like anything more than a third running back in his career. And if Correll Buckhalter is the answer, the question must be “How can we make our running back core even more injury prone than it was last year?”
3. The last four games for the Denver Nuggets have been, for lack of a better term, confusing. The Nugs began the week with a 38-point beatdown at the hands of the Celtics, and then followed up by nearly blowing a fourth-quarter lead at home against Atlanta. On Friday night, the Nugs turned up the defensive intensity for the first time in a while and were rewarded with a 90-79 win over the Lakers, a stunning result considering LA’s domination in recent matchups against Denver. Then, on Sunday night, a terrible road loss to Indiana. The Nuggets have to regain the consistent effort, particularly defensively, that they showed back in the season’s first three months, otherwise any current mention of the Nuggets as a playoff threat alongside the likes of Los Angeles and San Antonio is going to seem sadly laughable in retrospect come May.
4. Hey, didn’t you used to be the Colorado Avalanche, one of the proudest and most successful franchises in the NHL? Two hideous road losses in Atlanta and New York by the combined score of 10-1 have sunk the Avs further into the depths of the Western Conference basement. They’ve clearly quit on head coach Tony Granato, and not even the return of Paul Stastny has helped them look any more like a cohesive offensive unit.
5. Nothing matters less than spring training results, but I’d sure like to see the Rockies win one of those Cactus League games soon.
6. Here’s a little YouTube action for you – the broadcast introduction to the last second-round playoff game that the Nuggets played, back in 1994 against the Utah Jazz. It’s posted mostly for the sheer awesomeness of the NBA on NBC theme.
7. Of all the things that have happened this season for the Nuggets, the emergence of Chris Anderson as a viable back-up big man – as in, not only is he not killing the team when he’s on the floor, but he’s contributing defensively as a Marcus Camby-like presence on the blocks while adding some crucial offensive rebounding – has been among the coolest. It’s impossible not to enjoy the whole Birdman experience.
8. On the flip side, there’s the exposure of Anthony Carter of somebody who contributes nothing offensively and badly hurts the team when better players try to take him one-on-one (Joe Johnson just destroyed him in the fourth quarter on Wednesday night).
9. No stat line was more welcome through the first week of spring training than the two perfect innings twirled by Franklin Morales against the Chicago White Sox on Thursday afternoon. If Morales can regain some of the luster that earned him top prospect status coming into 2008, he provides the highest ceiling of any of the back-of-the-rotation candidates the Rockies have.
10. Denver sports blog you need to be reading of the week: The indispensible Purple Row, home to all things Rockies.
11. Link of the week: Rick Reilly’s uplifting story about a child who got to fulfill a lifelong dream by meeting John Elway.
12. The Rockies have already been bitten by the injury bug this spring, with Jeff Baker, Ian Stewart, and Brad Hawpe all missing time with various maladies. There isn’t much for either of these players to be concerned about as far as competition for a roster spot, but in regards to Stewart, I’m wondering if a return to AAA for regular at-bats wouldn’t be a better idea than having him only play twice a week until the inevitable Garrett Atkins trade.
13. Remember Todd Lichti?
14. And finally, goodbye to the Rocky Mountain News. Friday was one of the saddest days in Denver history, as the longest-running paper in the city’s history shut its doors for good. The Rocky had the best sports section in the city when it folded – Tracy Ringolsby and Jack Etkin on the Rockies, Jeff Legwold on the Broncos, and Chris Tomasson on the Nuggets were better than their Post counterparts, and Dave Krieger was the premier columnist. Thankfully, Krieger has already started over at the Post, where he’ll put Woody Paige and Mike Kiszla to shame on a weekly basis, and Ringolsby will appear on pre and post-game coverage of Rockies games on FSN Rocky Mountain. But I have a feeling that the coverage of our local teams won’t feel as complete without two papers competing against each other.
