Vinnie Verno is back!!! (Week 1 Philanthropy)

The other two picks on radio were Ohio St -24, and Rutgers -20

The show moves to 92.9 ESPN

The show has moved to 92.9 FM - and we will be on from 11a-2p.  Please tell everyone you know about the move.  I will put a post up this week about our move, but for now ---> alert the masses.

With the 25th pick the Grizzlies should select...

Draymond Green.  That is the official endorsement of The Chris Vernon Show.  There is no way that there are 24 players that are better than this kid.  He dribbles and passes like a guard and rebounds like a big.  He shot the cover off the ball in his workout here.  He fits the culture and Lionel Hollins would play him.  I know what I get with him.. good rotation player for years that will play hard every night.  Give me that guy.

Grizzlies owner Michael Heisley in studio (The Audio)

Michael Heisley joined us in studio today for the last hour of the show to talk about selling the Grizzlies, the new owner, the team and the draft, etc.  Here it is, guaranteed to entertain...

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Tony Allen in the studio (The Audio)

90 minutes of Tony Allen.  I'm not even going to write up everything you can hear about in this interview.  If you have a brain you will listen to it.  I get him closer to the mic after the first few minutes.  Here it is...

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Will Lionel figure it out? (Lineup analysis)

Wayne Winston is a professor at Indiana that happens to be an NBA advanced stats guru.  He has consulted multiple NBA teams, including the Dallas Mavericks, on what lineups and players to use.  He has no affiliation with the Grizzlies or the Clippers so I asked him to consult us on what is happening in the series.  I think there is real value in listening to someone that has no bias.  He is not telling us what he thinks he sees, and he is not looking to defend his favorite player or defend the coach.  He simply looks at the data and the data tells him what is working and what is not.
I have been very critical on the strategy used in this series so far and what we learned from Winston made me feel much better about my feelings.  Lionel Hollins is simply not using the best lineups at his disposal nearly enough.  If he figures it out the Grizzlies can beat the Clippers and make a dent in the next round.  If not, they are goin fishing.

What are the Grizzlies doing when they are winning?
Who is most important to their success offensively?
What is the Clippers kryptonite?
Who is killing the team when they are on the court?
Who should be playing more and who should be playing less?

Wayne Winston covered all of these topics.
Here is the interview...

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All Heart. Grit, Grind. (The Pics)

It's that time of year again.  I have gotten a ton of pictures sent to me over the last year of people wearing our Tony Allen shirt all over the earth.  Truly incredible stuff.  The shirt has been worn by the lead singer of MGMT at Musicfest - it has been on the Great Wall of China, Mt. Rushmore, the Berlin Wall, etc.  Every pic I got this year seemed to top whatever had been sent to us before.  We are going to sell them again this year for the playoffs outside the Forum.  I put together a slideshow of a bunch of the pics.  I added captions.  Check and see if your pic made it.  And THANK YOU!!!

Intern Mark's spectacular dunk attempt!

Back story:  for months our Intern Mark has been practicing with the "Kings of the Court" (The guys that dress up in Elvis costumes and dunk off of trampolines).  Well, last night was his big break and he was given a chance to perform.  Roser and I told him on the show that if he went in between his legs and dunked it we would give him $40.  Mark is the second dunker in the video - and the other person you hear on the video with me is Gary Parrish as we watched the moment of truth .....

Tony Allen on the show (The Audio)

Tony made his triumphant return to the show today for a really long interview that covers everything from his night of steals, the team, the Artest elbow, his desires to be a ref/coach, etc.  Once the conversation picks up, it becomes an all-timer for sure.  Here it is if you missed it...

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It's playoff time again... if you don't own our Tony shirt yet, or need a new one, you can buy them of the right side of this page - just click on The Chris Vernon Show Store.

OJ Mayo on the show (The Audio)

OJ Mayo came on the show on Tuesday to talk about where the team stands now and what they are capable of, his relationship w/ Lionel Hollins, playing alongside Gilbert Arenas, etc.

If you missed it....

OJ Mayo on The Chris Vernon Show

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The Ballad of Bobby Petrino (New Song)

Mad Dog Radio this weekend

We are on SiriusXM's Mad Dog Radio (Channel 86) this weekend...

Saturday 4-7p CST
and Sunday 7-11p CST

Debut on Mad Dog Radio

We make our debut on Mad Dog Radio on SiriusXM tommorow (Sunday).  If you have SiriusXM, you can listen to the show from 10a-1p CST on Channel 86.  If you don't have a satellite radio, go buy one.

RIP Bert Sugar

For at least the last 8 years our "Weekly Cigar with Bert Sugar" has been part of the show on Friday.  When I first started in radio I became friends with Bert and he agreed to be a weekly guest.  There are always people that help you along the way if you are able to achieve your goals - and Bert helped me more than he would have ever cared to admit.  I was so young when I was first put on the air and Bert validated me to an older audience.  He was a great friend, a great guest, and truly one of a kind.  I miss him already.

Here is one of the last appearances Bert made on the show where he describes his battle with cancer, etc.

Real Memphis fans will root for Louisville

Kentucky will play Louisville this weekend in the Final 4 and people wonder who Memphis fans will root for given that on one side is the former coach and on one side is the rival.  Easiest.  Answer.  Ever.  Memphis fans should root for Louisville.

Memphis is the wife that wasn't the best looking girl in the world (still pretty hot), but treated her husband like a king.  She let him do whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted, and then begged him to stay when he was about to leave her for a supermodel.  Not only did the husband leave her for the supermodel, but he tried to burn the house down after he walked out of the door.

Now what kind of reaction should the wife have had?

A) think of the good times, wish him the best, and feel sorry for herself

B) hope he gets hit by a train

There are a bunch of Memphis fans that have reacted in the first way.  These people make me want to puke.  These people have no dignity. The bolting husband is now having sex with the supermodel right in front of their face and they have to decide if they should root him on while he is doing it?  They should be rooting for him to get a disease.

Louisville is not even a real rival.  Most Memphis fans under the age of 40 don't walk around hating Louisville.  When they left for the Big East and Memphis stopped playing them, the rivalry died.  Not being in the same conference killed it.  Rooting for Louisville would only be hard for old fans and even they should be able to do it if it means total agony for Calipari.

Rick Pitino presented the best case for Memphis to get into the Big East (including anyone from Memphis).  You owe it to him to root for his team.  Forget that, you owe it to yourself to root for his team.  Have some dignity.

Real Memphis fans will root for Louisville this weekend.

Grizzlies GM Chris Wallace weekly segment (The Audio)

This was an eventful week on the segment.  Wallace talked extensively about signing Gilbert Arenas, and admitted first getting the idea from a blog.  Also, Demarcus called in with an all-timer.  If you missed it...

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On Gilbert Arenas...

Quick story:  When Gilbert Arenas was a rookie in Golden St. I walked into the Warriors locker room to say hello to Jason Richardson (who I'd met at his workout for Grizzlies).  I was talking to Richardson when Arenas (who is sitting in locker right next to us) says, "Chris Vernon!"  He appeared to be genuinely excited to see me.  I said - "Hey Gilbert, how do you know who I am?"  He responded-  "I don't, I'm just reading your media pass."  The goof was on me, but I've liked the guy ever since.

If the Grizzlies sign Gilbert Arenas, I'm all for it.  When you hear me get upset over guys playing or the Grizzlies signing guys, it is because they can't play.  If Arenas can't play and yet is getting a bunch of minutes, that would be a reason to be upset.  My bet is that he can play.

A lot of people have asked if he could mess up the chemistry and my answer is that I'm not worried about that.  Lionel Hollins is an empowered coach.  He dealt with Allen Iverson and last year he dealt with Jason Williams being added to the team last year.  I simply do not believe that Hollins would allow something to screw the team up.

Arenas was once one of the most likeable guys in the entire league.  In between injuries and the horrible incident in the locker room in Washington his career really went downhill.  I don't think Arenas is bad guy and his teammates always seem to love him.  I'd love for him to get his career back on track in Memphis.  If he can't, Hollins will get rid of him.  If he can, the Grizzlies will have a veteran back-up PG that can stretch the floor, guard big guards, and can hit big shots.  I see very little risk with a possible fantastic reward.

Hibachi!

Read this fantastic Arenas article from Feb by Sam Amick on SI.COM ---- ARENAS SPEAKS

Our Columbus NCAA Tourney Trip (Day 2)

This morning we wanted to check out the Ohio St. campus.  Me, Roser, and Jason Smith drove around the area and I was blown away with how nice the campus and surrounding area was.  We wanted to see the football stadium so we drove to where we could see it, but then decided to park and try to go inside.  We walked around until we found an open gate and strolled right in to check it out.  It was really cool to see it in person and the field looked perfect.

After we left the stadium we headed over to the HOMAGE store.  I have a ton of shirts that I've bought on their website and their retail store is located in Columbus, so we had to check it out.  As I expected, the store was awesome and Roser and Jason both bought shirts so they can be awesome like me.

We left the HOMAGE store and headed over to Katzinger's for lunch.  My buddy Ian Fitzsimmons used to work in Columbus (he is now at ESPN Dallas) swore to me that this was the place that we needed to eat lunch.  Ian knew was he was talking about because Katzinger's is the truth.  If you are ever in Columbus, go there for sure.

I got over to Nationwide Arena (which is a great facility) for the second half of the NC State/ San Diego St. game and it was strange because the place was packed but the majority of the fans seemed indifferent about who was winning.  It seemed like the crowd was local Ohio St. fans that just bought tickets to watch college bball.  NC State looked good in the game and CJ Leslie was an impressive athlete in person.

The second game was Georgetown/Belmont and I felt like the Bruins were in trouble when I saw the teams warming up.  I'm pretty sure every Hoya could dunk and Belmont had 4 or 5 guys that could hardly touch the net.  Belmont had a really good fan section which happened to be right behind me.  The section featured Belmont superfan Vince Gill...

Vince Gill boos, yells at the opposing team, and gets on the refs.  He is a true fan indeed.  I've met him a few times and he is the nicest guy ever.  He is obviously a huge country star but you would never have any idea by the way he carries himself.

Belmont ended up getting hammered by G'Town and now we are waiting for the Memphis game...





Our Columbus NCAA Tourney Trip (Day 1)

Last night after the show Roser and I left Memphis to head to Columbus for the first round of the NCAA tournament.  We made it almost all the way to Louisville before we got tired and had to pull off and get a hotel.  We ending up stopping and getting a hotel in Elizabethtown, KY - where we saw nobody that looked remotely like Orlando Bloom.  When choosing our hotel we weighed the risk of getting murdered vs. price.  We thought the Motel 6 attached to a Shoney's had a ratio that favored murder so we picked the La Quinta (which was $80 with my AAA card and seemed like low chance of being murdered). 
At the front desk the lady told me 3 times that if we smoked in the room there would be a $250 fine added to our charge.  She then handed me the keys to the room which had a warning on the little envelope that said if we smoked in the room there would be a $250 fine.  We got into the room and there were no less than 5 signs or warnings about smoking in the room.  It was incredibly weird.  Smoking in the rooms at La Qunta in Elizabethtown is a very serious issue that will be dealt with in a serious manner.

We drove to Columbus this morning and checked into the media hotel (which is the Hyatt Regency).  The hotel is super nice but there are a million high school kids here for some "future business leaders" conference.  I hate these nerds because we are on the 17th floor and it takes an hour when we want to get to and from the room.  The elevator stops on every floor and these nerds just keep piling in .  One of the nerds farted in the elevator and almost ruined my day.

Columbus is a really cool city from what I've seen so far.  The arena is nice, everything is centrally located downtown, and they have a bunch of cool bars and restaurants.  We went the Josh Pastner press conference and he charmed every media member in the place.  When you see media members that have never seen him in action before you remember how different he is (in terms of how happy and nice he is to everyone).  The team looked really loose but who knows what that means.  I guess we will know after we see them play.  I think they will beat St. Louis because their athletes will be able to swarm defensively and turn it into easy buckets on other end.

Earl "The Pearl" Monroe in studio (The Audio)

Earl Monroe is the coolest dude ever.  Earl Monroe loves talking, smiling, laughing, and watching "Charmed" on TV.  He spent almost a full hour in studio with us to talk about his new cause, his playing career, etc.  Here it is if you missed it...

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