The curse is broken!

Well, I went to the Bobcats game last night against the Wizards. And it was a highly entertaining, tense game, so I was stressing until the final 1.9 seconds that I might see Charlotte go 0-3 in the games I've attended this year. But at that 1.9 second mark, Raymond Felton hit a beautiful fadeaway shot to put the Bobcats up by two. I feared a 3-point buzzer beater by Washington, but they settled for an Antawn Jamison scoop shot that fell short, sealing the Bobcats' win and snapping their 3-game losing streak.

It was the best of the three games I've been to so far this season, and not just because Charlotte won. The game was close and tightly contested the entire way, with the teams ending each quarter within 3 points of each other. Neither team led by more than 7 points the entire game.

It's good to know I'm not a jinx on my hometown team. Now I can go to games worry-free!

Nice one, me.

I was looking back over some of my old Facebook status updates, and I found this one I wrote during the second round of the NFL playoffs:

"People who say baseball is boring, have you been watching the NFL playoffs? The rain delay in Game 5 of the 2008 World Series was more exciting than this."

Thought it was worth sharing. (Although, there was at least one exciting game in each round, admittedly.)

I might be bad luck...

Well, the Bobcats are 0-2 in games I've attended this season. They lost to Charlotte's former team, the Hornets, 104-99 on Saturday night.

The Cats started strong and led by 10 at halftime, but they crumbled in the 3rd quarter, being outscored 36-21. Charlotte's defense, their greatest strength all season, let up a barrage of Hornets buckets down the stretch. Although, some of what hurt the Bobcats was the fact that seemingly every 2nd half shot the Hornets put up was falling. Stephen Jackson gave the crowd some hope with about 30 seconds left when he converted an old fashioned 3-point play, but Charlotte again let New Orleans score and then couldn't deliver another basket at the offensive end.

It was disappointing to see the Bobcats show flashes of the exciting play that has gotten them into the playoff picture but then ultimately limp to a third consecutive loss. But I got extremely cheap tickets (thanks again, eBay!) to tonight's game against the Wizards, so hopefully I can see them turn it around.

On a final note, the Hornets' jerseys were kind of odd looking. And they seem to have at least five team colors: the "creole blue" and white of their warm-ups and standard uniforms, and the green, purple and gold of their "NOLA" jerseys. Strange. It's not like the Cavaliers, who wear throwbacks and alternates from their relatively long history. The Hornets have only been in "NOLA" since 2002! However, I admit to kind of liking the trippy two-sided jerseys.

Capital city connection?

The Washington Capitals and the Ottawa Senators each have winning streaks of at least 10 games (the Caps have won 11 straight). Is this a coincidence? Is there something about playing in a country's capital city? Was the Hurricanes' recent 4-game win streak attributable to them playing in the capital of North Carolina? What does this mean for the Coyotes, Avalanche, Thrashers, Bruins, Wild, Blue Jackets, Predators, Oilers and Maple Leafs? The only one of those teams with a significant winning streak is the Coyotes with an active string of 5 wins, although the Avs did have a 6-game streak in January. The Bruins have lost 8 straight, and the Oilers had lost 13 consecutive games before winning their last two. So, I guess there's no connection between recent success and playing in a state/provincial capital. But hey, there's nothing refuting the Caps/Sens connection!

These are the kinds of things I think about.

An observation about logos.

I was thinking about the logos of the four major professional sports leagues in North America. You know, Major League Baseball, the National Hockey League, the National Basketball Association and the National Football League. It occurred to me that the logos of MLB and the NBA both feature the silhouette of a player in red, white and blue, while the NHL and NFL logos are both in the shape of shields.





The MLB and NBA logos are both blue on the left, red on the right, and show a white outline of a man playing each respective sport in the middle. In the NBA's case, Jerry West's likeness is represented. These sports' logos are extremely similar but very different than those of the NHL and NFL. Those logos both take the form of a shield and prominently feature the league's initials, much more so than MLB (which doesn't feature the league's name within the logo itself) or the NBA (whose logo focuses more on the silhouette than the small initials).

So, why are the leagues' logos split down the middle in this way? Well, hockey and football are full-contact sports, while baseball and basketball are only limited-contact. I'm not sure if this actually had anything to do with the design of the logos, but it's interesting that they worked out that way. Perhaps the shield motif signifies that players wear a great deal of protective padding in hockey and football.

Who knows? I thought it was interesting to think about, though.