By Allen Moll
Hakeem Olajuwon is regarded as one of the best big men to ever step on a basketball court. As a NBA pro and collegian at Houston University, Olajuwon has done it all. He has been to the Final Four three times in college as part of the famed “Phi Slama Jama” (along with teammate Clyde Drexler), been to three NBA Finals (winning twice in ‘94 and ‘95), and won virtually every major individual award including MVP, Finals MVP and Defensive Player of the Year. He is currently the all time NBA leader in blocked shots and ranks tenth in scoring. As an offensive player, he had no equal: he had a dazzling array of low post spins and fakes that he used to score more than 26,000 points, in his 18 year NBA career. He even had his own signature move dubbed, “The Dream Shake”, which was virtually impossible to defend. After his retirement from the NBA in 2002, Hakeem moved with his family to the country of Jordan to focus on his devout Muslim faith until he received the ultimate honor in 2008: induction into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame. (Full Article)
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Saturday, October 3, 2009
Aaron Sanchez' Aflac Rookie card selling on eBay for $79.00
Barstow High School baseball star Aaron Sanchez' rookie card is selling for
as much as $79.00 on eBay.
Sanchez gets big-league treatment at AFLAC
August 17, 2009 10:29 PM
By MATTHEW PETERS, Sports Editor
SAN DIEGO • They showed up in throngs of light blue yet went almost unnoticed until the fourth inning.
When Aaron Sanchez emerged from the West team dugout to take the mound in the bottom of the fourth inning Sunday night at the AFLAC All American High School Baseball Classic at Petco Park in San Diego, they made their presence well known.
The Barstow High School pitcher received possibly the loudest reception of the night as he got his turn to pitch.
“It was pretty loud,” Sanchez said.
Family and friends, who took up almost the entire section directly behind home plate, stood up in light blue “Sanchez” T-Shirts, which Sanchez’s family printed and sold more than 100 for the game. Several also held a “Sanchez Gang” sign in support.
“Everyone from Barstow came down to watch this guy play,” joked West coach Steve Vickery after the game. The West and East played to a 4-4 tie after 10 innings. The teams consisted mostly of players entering their final year of high school competition.
For the most part Sanchez didn’t disappoint his transplanted hometown crowd. He faced five batters in one inning of work, struck out the final batter he faced, walked one and allowed one run on one hit as the West exited the inning with a 2-1 lead. He reached 92 mph with his fastball.
“I wish I would have done a little bit better than what I did, but it’s all right,” Sanchez said. “I didn’t like the run.”
It was a near big-league experience for the 17-year-old right-handed pitcher playing on the Padres home field in front of 8,027 fans. Sanchez signed autographs alongside Las Vegas High School catcher Bryce Harper, who appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated in June and was call “the LeBron James of baseball” by the magazine, and several other teammates for about 15 minutes following the game. He described the pregame autograph session as “even crazier.”
“The experience was probably the best thing that could have ever happened,” Sanchez said. “Just the fans and the camaraderie and asking people for their signatures and everything else, it’s just a big-time thing. It makes you feel kind of special at a young age.”
These types of events are becoming more and more typical for Sanchez. By the end of the summer, he’ll have played in five big-league stadiums.
It’s a spot that could be an even more familiar setting in the years to come. Sanchez gained scouts before the summer but enhanced his profile with appearances in several other showcases and tournaments across the country.
“I think he’s going to be a big-time player,” Vickery said. “Scouts love his loose arm and then you look at his frame and you say, ‘Hey man, we could put 25 to 30 pounds on this kid ... and he’s going to get it up there.’ He’s helped himself out by this event.”
While Sanchez might have made an impression on scouts, he left a bigger one on his West teammates. Harper, who caught for Sanchez in the fourth inning, said they became friends throughout the week of events for AFLAC and hopes to say in touch.
“I liked his stuff a lot,” Harper said. “He has pretty good off-speed (pitches). His fastball ran a little bit so that was a little hard to catch, but I thought he threw really well actually.”Rancho Buena Vista infielder Tony Wolters said Sanchez was a great teammate throughout the week.
“He’s funny. He has big legs,” said Wolters, who was named the game’s most valuable player. “He’s a very smart pitcher. He throws very hard. He’s going to get drafted.”
Players arrived in San Diego for the game on Wednesday and participated in a variety of activities throughout the week from baseball practices to visiting Sea World to playing games at their hotel. Visiting Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego was the highlight of week, Sanchez said.
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The Baseball Card Industry is in a Serious Slump
by Claudia CowanIndustry experts say card sales have dropped 80% from over a billion dollars in the early 90’s to about $200-million dollars last year. The trend has caused most card makers to shut down, and where there were once 5-thousand card shops in the u-s, today there are fewer than 500. I spoke to industry insiders, retailers, distributors, and collectors to try to figure out what is causing the slide, and lots of factors play into it. Traditional collectors got into the hobby for love of the game, then, over the years, came those who saw it purely as an investment which drove up demand and prices. Half a dozen card companies produced huge quantities – which people bought up as a kind of gamble. But for most, it didn’t pay off. The weak economy, player strikes, and the steroid scandal have all driven down interest and value. A Barry Bonds card once worth 50 or 60 dollars is barely worth $15 now.
On top of that, industry analysts say the future looks bleak because of competition from other card-based games. My son bypasses the sports cards and heads directly for the “magic” and “Pokemon” cards. If he’s interested in knowing more about the giants or a’s or a particular player’s stats – he goes online.It’s not that the card makers, like tops and upper deck, aren’t trying. We saw some very interesting boxes that hearken back to the days of the old tobacco baseball trading cards, using today’s players on nostalgic backdrops. A box cost about a hundred dollars, which the store manager says isn’t a bad price – problem is, he said, the companies aren’t marketing their product well enough to let people know it’s out there. Others debate that point, saying in a shrinking market, mainstream marketing dollars are increasingly hard to come by.
The good news is – collectors are still out there – just not as many, and they’re not buying as often. We met a young man who began collecting cards with his father, and now specializes in “relic” cards that may feature a players autograph, jersey swatch, or chip of bat they’d used in a game. But there are more sellers than buyers these days, and the store, filled floor to ceiling with dusty trading cards and comic books, was mostly empty. As one collector told me, “I think we’re going to see the cards fade away. I hate to say that, but 20 years from now, people may not know what a baseball card is.”
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