Thursday Blogging

Mavs fade late, lose in Utah …Tough to accept defeat at the hands of the lummox, Mehmet Okur, but the Turk had his way in the final few minutes and with overly-tattooed Deron Williams making his NBA debut in grand style, the Mavs couldn’t keep up. By the way, Deron Williams is everything the Mavs hoped Devin Harris would be. Williams, the #3 pick in the draft in 2005, look confident and ready to control a game from the point. Harris, the #5 pick in the draft in 2004, looks like his team doesn’t believe he can control anything when he is on the floor.

Fate seemed to be fighting the Mavericks, too. They were up five points in the waning seconds of the third quarter, but Williams let fly from 60 feet at the buzzer, and the prayer was answered as it banked hard off the glass and into the net.

It was the highlight of a wonderful debut for the No. 3 overall pick, who was a pain in the Mavericks' neck all night and finished with 18 points.

"Deron Williams is an old-school basketball player, and I really like that," Johnson said. "He's awfully special.

A night after the Mavericks had erased a 17-point deficit in the fourth quarter, they fell apart late against the Jazz. They poured what energy they had left into the first three quarters. But then the shots started coming up short, and the Jazz found another gear.

The Mavericks were 3-of-19 in the fourth quarter and had six of those misses swatted away. Utah outrebounded the Mavericks, 17-7, in the final frame.

"They continued to fight us the whole game," Josh Howard said. "They hit some big buckets."

Are the Stars really that bad? Evidently. After getting pounded at home by Los Angeles (not the 1984 Edmonton Oilers) 7-2 a few weeks ago, they allow that same team to pound them again …

Playing in their 500th regular-season home game in Dallas, the Stars were drubbed again by the Los Angeles Kings. Wednesday's 6-3 defeat displayed a home power play that is among the worst in the league, home goaltending that is among the worst in the league and a 3-4-1 home record that has the team wasting what was set up to be a fast start.

"If you look at the schedule, it's been favorable for us, with home games and the rest period we've had," defenseman Philippe Boucher said. "But we haven't made the most of it, and we have to play better in our building."

Especially when you consider what is slipping away. The Stars had a chance to get within one point of the Pacific Division-leading Kings, but fell to 6-5-1 (13 points). Los Angeles jumps to 9-4-0 (18 points). The Stars have been outscored by the Kings, 17-9, in three games at American Airlines Center.

Galloway properly touts Jeff Ireland …

Out of the eight players drafted in April, only two haven't been heard from. One of those, safety Justin Beriault, was a major training camp story, but went on injured reserve because of knee problems.

The other, second-round linebacker Kevin Burnett, is the one mystery element. He's the lone rookie who would be classified as a disappointment thus far.

But with veteran Al Singleton now out for the season (also injured in the Arizona game), Burnett will get a second chance to show something.

Overall, Ireland had one immediate observation on this draft class:
"I'm not necessarily surprised. The blueprint on this draft was to find guys who could help us right now. The one thing I stressed to our scouts was we had to find players who were ready to make a contribution.

"We were a 6-10 team a year ago. We had two No. 1 picks [and five picks out of the first 132 spots], so we weren't going to be able to improve unless we could find rookies who could play right now."

Then again, there's nothing more challenging in today's NFL than being right on first-round picks, particularly two of them.

"As the record shows around the league, first-rounders are not a slam dunk," Ireland said. "But our homework was good on both Ware and Spears. And then, as we said all along, we thought we got a first-round talent in Canty (who was available in the fourth round because of an eye injury)."

This is too good to be true Packers shut down press conference after reporter's cell phone goes off again ...

It was at least the third time that a phone had gone off during one of Sherman's news conferences this season.

"I don't understand that," Sherman told the group of 40 to 50 reporters assembled in the Packers' media auditorium before he exited. "That stuff to me, I'll be totally honest with you, is a total lack of respect for each other. Forget me. You don't have to respect me, but respect each other."

Director of public relations Jeff Blumb later handed out a memo to reporters stating that the Favre news conference would be canceled unless the reporter whose phone rang came forward and admitted it was his. When no one came forward between the end of the locker room period at 12:45 p.m. and the end of practice at 3 p.m., Favre's news conference was canceled.

"I made the decision because no one came forward to accept responsibility for the cell phone going off," Blumb said. "It wasn't made based on it happening one time, but continuous times for multiple weeks. We've given warnings to turn off cell phones. It's disrespectful to Coach Sherman and it's disrespectful to Brett Favre."

Rockets unveil their new look roster …

For you who don’t know it, read up on The UFC here if you so choose…

the best of Bob Knight …

Super Friends meet Office Space …Did Superman put a cover sheet on his TPS Report?

Restless Leg Syndrome? …I might be in big trouble…

Some interesting Swoopes background…

Ever since Swoopes signed to play basketball at Texas in the late 1980s but abruptly left school after just two weeks in Austin, rumors have persisted as to the reason for her exit.

It was said that she was pregnant and went back to her hometown of Brownfield, near Lubbock, to give birth. Swoopes has vehemently denied that.

It was also said that Swoopes asked Texas coach Jody Conradt for a transfer because she had been inappropriately approached sexually by a female associated with the Texas women's basketball program.

Swoopes denies that assertion as well.

"I keep trying to figure out where that came from," Swoopes said. "But no, neither one of those is true. Me coming back from Texas, the only reason I did it was because I was homesick.

Roto Authority was on this last week – Matt Lawton, Steroid user ….

Peter Elkin’s bid to become an “approved blog” …under review…

Email to end it, on the UFC:

Dear Sports Sturm,
I am a fan of the UFC on Spike. The season finale last year between Forrest Griffin and Stephan Bonner was pure greatness. Two guys beating the crap out of each other is about as manly as you can get. We can throw Gribble's input out the window. The man's ultimate fantasy is having a ménage with a chick and another dude. Nothing gets my engine redlining like the sight of a naked man in the throws of passion. That fact alone negates his argument.

Dan thinks everything is gay. I could see Dan walking his young daughter telling her of all the gayness in Grapevine. "Hey Ava, look at that gay dog." Not sure if I spelled that right but that is besides the point. The UFC show is great. Two guys beating each other is about as far from gay as possible. If they were coming to the octagon wearing feather boas and Elton John glasses, I might lean towards gay. What did Dan do when he got into fights as a kid and as a high school and college kid? Oh, I don't fight because we might end up on the ground wrestling. I know you just insulted my manhood and slapped me but I don't want to get into a fight because we might end up wrestling on the ground. That is how real fights happen. Two guys start swinging and somehow they end up on the ground with one guy on his back and the other guy kneeling over him swinging at the guy's face. I have seen many fights and hardly if any are like boxing matches. If I heard correctly Dan said boxing was not gay. Boxers hug each other a lot when they get tired. I agree that the attire needs to be amended a little but other than that it is great. The UFC guys that fight like Liddell and Couture fight in what equates to board shorts and Muy Thai shorts. In closing, tell your buds to put the gaydar detector down and watch UFC 2.

P1 Josh