Fran Blinebury Fan Club

All the "Strike Two" article did was kiss up to Dream, talk about how the Rockets weren't a playoff team without Dream (not even taking into account potential trades), and basically laying the seeds for his gleeful "Dream Curse" and infamous "Curses! No Mo luck!" article where he gloated about Mo's injury screwing up the Rockets, all because his sugar daddy Hakeem was off to Canada.

 

I agree with everything CBFC said except for the fact that the Warriors girls sucked. I got turned down by every single one. I even offered mone..... never mind.


Hey whatever happened to Eddie Seffko?

 

That's weird, I'm watching a special on Andrew Dice Clay right now...heh, heh...heh, heh... that wasn't funny Scarface.

 

Richard Connelly, who writes for the Houston Press and does a regular column for them called News Hostage about the absurdity that is local news, once said, referring to a Blinebury column that got out of hand, that Blinebury's "random metaphor generator" went on the blink and he had to improvise.

Classic!

 

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.h.../bk/bkn/1148639

Welcome to the Moochie Norris Show.

Here is Moochie taking a flying leap into a pile of bodies on the left side of the lane, trying to make contact, begging to draw a foul.

Here is Moochie on the dribble, hammering the ball into the floor like a carpenter being paid by the nail.

Here is Moochie going behind his back or between his legs, doing everything but jumping off Turbo's trampoline and getting in the bump-and-jiggle line with the Power Dancers.

Get used to it.

For the next four to six weeks, as Steve Francis makes his only appearances in the midcourt tunnel while waiting for the plantar fascia in his left foot to mend, the Rockets are Moochie's team.

And Oscar Torres' team. And Tierre Brown's team.

Rockets Lite. Less filling and, well, less filling.

Put Cuttino Mobley over there on the sidelines with a pair of bad ankles, and what happens is what you expect to happen. Kings 89-84.

Not that Kenny Thomas and his tag-along wannabes didn't have their moments Tuesday night, even taking a one-point lead in the fourth quarter when Moochie hit a runner with just under nine minutes to play.

Which might have gotten the crowd onto its feet, if there had been a crowd. Or if the intimate gathering hadn't been too busy playing children's games during timeouts as part of an overall game presentation that is lamer than a three-legged dog race.


Francis to fight impatience
The Rockets missed shots. The Kings took advantage of their chances, which is what the good teams do. Even the good teams that are playing the latter half of a back-to-back and just blew one the previous night to lowly Memphis. The Rockets, quite obviously, are not a good team now. Not when their two best players are not in uniform, though Mobley is expected to return by the weekend.

The outlook on Francis is less definite. He says he'll be back up and flying through the lower levels of the stratosphere as soon as his mandatory five games on the injured list are complete and he's had enough champing at the bit. This will be the longest stretch of basketball Francis has missed in his career -- college or pro -- and it's going to be very difficult for the bundle of energy to endure.

The medical staff would prefer that Francis play it more conservative and stay down until the connective tissue in the arch of his left foot heals completely. There is said to be no fear that the injury is chronic. In fact, it is believed the scar tissue that forms in the healing process actually makes the foot stronger and the problem less likely to recur.

In the meantime, what the Rockets will have is plenty of time to practice bailing water.

"I see this as an opportunity," said coach Rudy Tomjanovich. "You can always turn an adversity into some kind of a positive. Guys can step up and carry the load. We'll get Tierre into the rotation. It's a chance for Oscar, for Moochie, for all of them."


Thomas goes it alone
What it could be is the stretch when the hustling, battling, relentless Thomas simply wears himself out by trying to be everything for the Rockets at both ends of the floor. There were times in the first half against the Kings when if it weren't for Thomas, you'd have needed a stethoscope to detect a pulse in the Rockets.

What it will certainly be is a critical stretch when the Rockets could fall completely from playoff contention, even in the fantasy world they normally inhabit.

Before anyone gets carried away with the notion that Francis' injury is one of those cruel twists of fate that is derailing an up-and-coming contender, consider that the Kings -- a real playoff team -- have been playing all season without their best player, Chris Webber, and are still 11-4.

Consider, too, that the Rockets were only 7-7 -- a perfectly fitting, thoroughly mediocre .500 -- before Francis and Mobley took their seats Tuesday night.

What they have shown is the same penchant for the flamboyant from the previous two seasons and the same nagging tendency to ignore the basics of the game. As in failing to show up on defense, making bad decisions and not hitting wide-open shots. Falling behind 21 to the Clippers. Relying on Kelvin Cato.

The Rockets like to talk about their energy. But unless there is a mental effort to match, you might as well be running on a treadmill and getting nowhere.

Which is where they are for the next four to six weeks with the Moochie Show. But no different, really, from where they've already been.

 

Great Thread CBFC.

Everyone should send Fran condolences though ...... he has had a rough autumn.



1. His bread and butter "deep throat" insiders info contact now resides in dinosaur country most of the season.

2. He's having some personal body image conflicts:
(a) His hairline now recedes so far back that he not only doesn't know if he's coming or going, but others now can't tell by looking at him if he is walking toward them or moving away.
(b) His office romance with Jennie the pool typist in the "World News" section just ended, because of her unyeilding attraction for Ken Hoffman's nine year-old pet schnauzer.
(c) His membership at the "Full Figure Weight Loss Center" got withdrawn when they found out his breast size was far too large a challenge, even for them.

3. His quest to burn all remaining copies of his High School Yearbook got extinguished when Marjorie Yount, his senior year Home Room Teacher, sent a copy to "Houston Today" so they could recapture that startling photograph of him in his basketball uniform for a "Fran" tribute show. Yes, there he was in full regalia. Looking like a fur ball with a kumquat up his butt - the school mascot cheering on the the Wacky Wombats of Wabash,Texas. Yeah he had a great three-year "basketball" career with the guys in the bus after every game.

4. And, to make matters even worse the only guy that he was ever able to relate to got fired yesterday. (No, it was not Craig Roberts- that was a shameful incident.) It was the annual Christmas Party planner for the 13,000 Enron Employees. Fran was going to be guest speaker this year and lecture on "How to Successfully Hoodwink the Media by Publishing False and Misleading Info, Year after Year" or as he parphrased it : "My Life, So Far"





Give Franny a break you guys.

 

Absolutely fabulous post, CBFC. I nominate you to take his place if we could ever successfully get him fired!

Fran is just an awful writer. I don't always disagree with his opinions, but they're always expressed poorly.

And yes, everyone is entitled to an opinion. But some are much better than others .

 

Blinebury should work the same place as Craig Roberts does...

...nowhere!

 

i personally think it's quite poor for the (alleged) senior journalist at the chron to only write negative pieces about the team. He hasn't posted anything positive when at all, least of all when loosing, yet is very quick with a "detailed" piece when the proverbial hits the fan (injury, nasty loss, trade of your source...)

 

First of all, great thread CBFC!

I think that somewhere in the Houston Chronicle charter is a requirement that all of its writers be bad to borderline mediocre. 'Don't want to make anyone jealous or self-conscious, now!'

Just more proof that Congress should pass a bill allowing, or to assist in, all households to have computer and internet access. People wouldn't have to throw their money away on Chronicle subscriptions, and could read well-written articles on line.

'Curse of the Dreambino' (What a travesty, Fran! Create your own phrases!)

 

I've been a fan of Blinebury's ever since:

A) I figured out he's a "he" and not a "she"-- when I first moved to Houston, I honestly could not tell. It took years of wondering before...

B) Fran got his ass drop-kicked by Jerry Glanville in a brawl at a restaurant. At that point, I kinda figured that Glanville wouldn't be b****-slapping an actual b**** around-- therefore, "Fran" was actually a man.

However, this is as far as my analysis has gone. I suppose, in the interest of science, the issue of It-Thing Blinebury's gender must remain an open one.

 

One more for the festering pile.

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/sports/bk/bkn/1170935

Hakeem rejuvenated and embraced by Raptors
By FRAN BLINEBURY
Copyright 2001 Houston Chronicle


SAN ANTONIO -- Mamadou N'diaye is a 7-footer out of Senegal, by way of Auburn, currently in his second season of learning the NBA ropes. So at the conclusion of a morning shootaround inside a virtually empty Alamodome, the most senior of his teammates promptly tied him in knots.


Associated Press
Hakeem Olajuwon tries to control a rebound Wednesday night while doing battle with old rival David Robinson.
There was a juke step, then a head fake and a lean-in with the left shoulder that got N'diaye off his feet to commit a foul while a soft jumper banked off the glass and into the net.

There was a nifty little crossover dribble that left N'diaye grasping at air as a wide-open 10-footer swished home.

Then, as about half a dozen Toronto buddies gathered around to watch, there was a spin to the left, a whirl back into the lane, a long right arm extended and the graceful flip of a wrist under the hoop for a reverse layup that was fresh and sweet.

Sound familiar?

"Sometimes," said a laughing Hakeem Olajuwon, "you have to show them the tricks."

The old dog was back in Texas for the first time in 2 1/2 months, and the only thing different, really, was the purple uniform.

And, of course, the fact the Raptors think he can still play.

"This experience has added a different dimension to my career," he said. "It's been better than I ever expected. I'm so glad I made the move."

David Robinson only wishes Olajuwon had moved farther away, to Mars or Jupiter maybe. Then Hakeem wouldn't have been around Wednesday night to pick up where he left off as the Admiral's personal torpedo.

On the first possession of the game, Robinson pulled up for a jumper from the top of the key, found Olajuwon's hand in his face, and fired an airball.

There was a fadeaway jumper over Robinson from the right side, a classic up-and-under move for a hoop on Robinson from the left side. Olajuwon blocked a short jumper and a layup try by Tim Duncan and, at one point in the second quarter, had Robinson so befuddled by two shots whacked back in his face the Admiral staggered out of bounds for a 24-second violation and simply handed the ball to Hakeem. Olajuwon finished with nine points, six rebounds and nine blocked shots.

"He showed he still has all the old shakes and moves," said Robinson, when he finally stopped twitching.

One gets the feeling Robinson must have nightmares of checking into his room at the nursing home when he's 80 and finding Olajuwon waiting to give his wheelchair a flat or pull out the line on his IV bottle.

Not that this is the mid-1990s and Olajuwon is capable of being a Most Valuable Player. Not that the Raptors even want him to lead the way on this Vince Carter-fueled club.

But he is a presence in the middle, which only makes sense. He feels respected again, which surely matters more.

Maybe it is only natural after 17 years with the same organization. What you do becomes unappreciated. In the end, you just wear out your welcome.

"The first thing I need to say about that is my experience in Houston for all those years cannot be duplicated," Olajuwon said. "I am so grateful for all of that -- to the fans, to the city. That will never change. Houston will always be my home, and it will always be the high point of my basketball career.

"But over the past couple of years, there was very clearly a disagreement between myself and members of the organization about what I'm capable of doing. I was rejected by them. It was never handled honestly.

"The Rockets organization would say one thing -- what they thought was the right thing -- to the public. But minds were made up all along.

"They were ready to go in a different direction. They wanted to be young and start over. They wanted me to just go away. I just said that it didn't make sense from a basketball standpoint. From the time I came from Nigeria, through my years in college and with the Rockets, what I've always known is that the center position is vital.

"If I was going to play for them, I wanted to contribute. Rudy (Tomjanovich), Les (Alexander), they wanted me to have a farewell tour, play a few minutes at the beginning of the game, wave to the crowd and then sit on the bench.

"They were the ones looking into the past. I was trying to look to the future, to find a new way to contribute. But a way that was just as important."

It wasn't his teammates, Olajuwon insisted, who made him feel uncomfortable.

"I love Steve Francis and Cuttino Mobley, and I enjoyed playing with them," he said. "We enjoyed playing with each other. I think I had things I could contribute to their games. I could make their jobs easier. They could make my job easier. It only made sense for the old and new to work together."

In Toronto, Olajuwon has found a locker room and an organization willing to benefit simply from the presence, the aura of one of the all-time greats. Not to mention a still-live body.

"Everybody is still getting acclimated as a team," said Raptors coach Lenny Wilkens. "We're still growing. What Hakeem gives us is credibility."

Where the Rockets viewed him as the same old stuff, in Toronto he is on hand to show this toddling franchise how a champion looks and acts.

"I like having him on my side," said Carter, who left Wednesday's game at halftime with a calf injury. "That's why I worked so hard to get him here. I'm going to like him more in April."

That's why the Raptors, 12-10 after losing 108-95 to the Spurs, brought in Olajuwon. For the playoffs, when the pace of games traditionally slows, when teams rarely go far without a force in the middle. They are pacing him at barely 22 minutes per game, hoping to keep him fresh and healthy to contribute when it counts.

"I'm not trying to score 20 points a night," he said. "I don't want to play 48 minutes. The Rockets always tried to make it out that I was the one who would not let go, but they are the ones with the shallow mentality.

"Look at the Lakers organization. If one of their franchise players wanted to play, they always accommodated him. If he wanted to move into the front office, they kept him a part of the family.

"Rudy, Les, the Rockets pretended to say all the right things for the public. But I know better. They wanted it to look like I was the one being disloyal, that I wanted to go. They know the disloyalty was in their organization.

"What I got was, they were going to do me a favor to bring me back. They gave me a take-it-or-leave-it offer. At first I was upset. But as it went on, I opened my mind to other possibilities and to look more clearly at how my career could end. Not on their terms, but on mine. They had the last shot in the game. They took it. They missed. I am running my own race now."

While the Rockets seem to be running backward. Does it get much worse than scraping the bottom in league attendance and losing 11 in a row? Unless, of course, it becomes 12, 13 and more.

The Rockets didn't want a 38-year-old Olajuwon. So they brought in a 39-year-old Kevin Willis. The Rockets didn't want Olajuwon's aches and pains that come with age and his high salary. So they picked up Glen Rice with bad feet, no shot and a contract that will keep them hamstrung for three more years. The Rockets didn't want to be trapped into no upside. So they shackled themselves to Kelvin Cato and Moochie Norris.

There are injuries, yes, to explain part of a plummeting 7-16 season. But not to use as an excuse for a franchise stuck on a treadmill to mediocrity with a new arena to fill in two years.

"When the situation became clear, I had a plan to move on and start fresh," Olajuwon said. "Their plan shows ignorance.

"I couldn't be better. I couldn't be happier right now. My family has joined me in Toronto, and it feels good. We have sellout crowds almost every night -- 19,000. How does that compare to a half-empty building?

"Sure, I keep an eye on the Rockets. Houston is home and always will be. I want those young guys to do well. I want Steve to come back and be healthy. I want them at full strength when they come to Toronto next month."

The too-old man cackled like a kid.

"No excuses," Hakeem Olajuwon said.

 

Hey CBFC etc,

here's one the wrecks it all for ya, sorry to disappoint

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/sports/blinebury/1174262

Contrite Taylor deserves pardon
By FRAN BLINEBURY
Copyright 2001 Houston Chronicle

Somebody will have watched the taped TV interviews with Maurice Taylor and conclude that it was easy.

Sure, just stand up there in front of the cameras and blow off an apology like it was so much mar1juana smoke.

It wasn't easy. It never is, if you mean it.

Taylor is a 6-9, 260-pound power forward accustomed to throwing his weight around. But there was nothing imposing about the way he looked Friday night inside the locker room at Westside Tennis Club.

Not with his fiancée standing at the back of the room. Not with Rockets general manager Carroll Dawson off to one side. Not with the bright lights on, the cameras rolling, and Taylor's broad shoulders slumped inside a gray warm-up suit while beads of sweat were running a fast break across his forehead.

"I abused mar1juana," Taylor said. "I should have known better."

Yes, he should have.

There are no explanations, no rationalizations to make coming up short in matters of personal responsibility acceptable.

Not to the outside world. Not to yourself.

Some of us know this better than others.

You apologize to the people you let down -- family, friends, co-workers, fans -- because it's all you can do. They are words, and they're all you have to try to fill in the empty spot you've created in your own sense of self.


Confession penalty enough
What you never will forget are the expressions on those faces you're never quite sure will look at you the same way again. You don't even see the same look back from the mirror.

"I used bad judgment," said Taylor, already crippled by a ruptured Achilles' tendon. "I am not taking this lightly. It will never happen again. I'm as embarrassed about this situation as anybody. I'm not the type of guy to have something like this happen."

None of us is. At least, that's what we think. Until, maybe, it does.

Taylor, we are pretty certain, is not like former Dallas Cowboy Nate Newton, caught twice allegedly rolling down the highway with hundreds of pounds of mar1juana. Taylor is a 25-year-old who was more than willing to face the music for his error.

According to the terms of the drug policy of the NBA and the National Basketball Players Association, Taylor did not have to admit to anything publicly. The strictly adhered-to policy says the NBA cannot disclose the specific violation. The team is not even told the nature of the violation. That is a personal matter between the individual and the directors of the after-care program.

Taylor didn't want the episode to remain cloaked in secrecy. He didn't want to hear the whispers, listen to the speculation.

"I'm a stand-up guy," he said.

A guy who immediately told the Rockets he wanted to go public, who stood up earlier in the day before his teammates and later in the evening before the media and admitted his mistake.

"Guys on the team were supportive, but I let them down," Taylor said. "They're the guys I go to war with. Obviously, those guys were not happy. But now I've got to miss an additional five games, and I let them down in that respect, too. I feel like I really let down the coaching staff. They've invested a lot in me."


Another shock to the system
This is how a nightmare season gets worse. With 10, 11, 12 losses in a row. With Steve Francis shackled to the bench for several more weeks. With Glen Rice also sidelined. With former franchise player Hakeem Olajuwon hitting broadside with a verbal attack.

Now one of the bright stars in the foundation the Rockets are trying to build for the future, a player in whom they just invested $48 million for six years, gets hit with a drug bust.

Dawson, who has been around the Rockets seemingly forever, remembers what it was like in the mid-1980s when Lewis Lloyd, Mitchell Wiggins and John Lucas were caught in the cocaine net and the franchise had to play on through that black eye.

"It's been awhile," Dawson said. "But there were some flashbacks that went through my mind."

There are no indications this incident is anywhere near as serious as that. Though the anti-drug policy does not call for a five-game suspension until a player has multiple "strikes," that does not mean Taylor tested positive before. It could mean he missed a scheduled appointment for an annual drug test. It could mean a number of things.

"It never happened before," Taylor insisted.

More important it doesn't happen again. That's the chance he deserves.

 

what no praise CB????

 

Hey, what's up with Fran Riding Rudy's sack these days?

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/sports/bk/bkn/1192789




Rockets can't win for losing and losing
By FRAN BLINEBURY
Copyright 2001 Houston Chronicle

LOS ANGELES -- May auld acquaintance be forgot.

The sooner the better, if you don't mind.

There are worse things, of course, we know than to lose 15 in a row or 17 out of 19 games.

But if you're the Rockets, always hopeful about a new tomorrow, what a new sunrise seems to bring is only another chance to get burned.

"I cringe every time the phone rings," said coach Rudy Tomjanovich.

This time the call came late in the afternoon and this time the word was that Steve Francis was suffering from flu-like symptoms and a reoccurrence of the migraine headaches that have plagued him.

That's the Rockets' season in a nutshell. One game back from a spell on the injured list with ruptured tissue in his left foot and Stevie Franchise is back on the shelf, this time sitting hunched over like a ghost on the bench in a white hood.

Kenny Thomas joins him with a hip pointer. Glen Rice already has a patellar strain in his right knee, Mo Taylor is gone for the season with a torn achilles Achilles' tendon and Dan Langhi has tendinitis.

When do you say it can't get any worse?

"I know it always can," Tomjanovich said.

A wise man. Or at least one who knows there is always room for another bruise.


No Shaq, no problem
The Lakers were playing without Shaquille O'Neal, which might be like seeing the Grand Canyon without the big hole in the ground.

But the Lakers of Kobe Bryant and the rest were still enough. Everybody is still enough for the Rockets these days. That's the problem. They're going to stop counting player-games missed and start counting player-months missed.

If Nebraska, according to many, doesn't belong in the Rose Bowl playing for the national championship, why do the Rockets even belong on the same floor with the two-time NBA champion Lakers, pretending they play in the same league?

"Because you have to look at it that way," Tomjanovich said. "You have to take your licks and look around you and see what you have and then just go to it."

That's the way it is in professional sports. Nobody feels sorry for you. Even when you're limping.

If there are silver linings to the dark cloud that has been following them around, it's that the Rockets have confirmed what they thought they were getting when they traded three first-round draft choices for Eddie Griffin.

The Rockets also have learned Oscar Torres is a keeper. He may not know the language, but he knows he belongs as he puts up jumpers and takes the ball to the hole with a sense of knowing.

They don't know yet about Terence Morris, who is 6-9 and intriguing. Does he have a firm offensive move he can use as a foundation? Does he have a stopper's mentality on defense? Against the Lakers on Sunday night, he frequently played as if the object of the game was to try not to make contact with another body on the floor. There were Laker Girls in spandex who were getting more physical.


Desperate dribbling
The Rockets know Kelvin Cato is not the answer at center and never will be. They just won't say that out loud, because it is considered a sign of weakness to ever admit that you made a mistake. A whopping big one at that.

So they plug on dutifully, faithfully showing up for every game on the schedule and some of them, like Cuttino Mobley and Moochie Norris, play frantically and with a sense of desperation, pounding the ball into the hardwood as if they were being paid by the dribble.

They are still 10 games from the halfway mark and the dream of the playoffs, of course, has long been torched in the minds of the fans who don't bother to show up at home games.

Where we will find out the most about this bunch is in how they play through the second half of the season. This is Mobley's fourth year as a pro. It is the third for Francis.

How many times do we turn over the page on the calendar and write off the indiscretions on the floor, their callow mistakes as merely the product of youth?

Is it time to stop ignoring the Rockets and start demanding more of them?

"I'm tired of talking about moral victories myself," Tomjanovich said. "I don't give a damn about coming close. We need to get tired of this and do something about it. Get to the next level."

It is all part of the process. When the heat is turn up, winners are either forged of steel or losers melt into slag.

"Maybe the new year will bring health and prosperity," said Rudy T.

Or eye strain from too much looking into the future.

 

same as usual

 

i thought the double meaning in the sentence made up for the use of 'dead' words!