Joy Livingstone (I presume) gave this list of Judas' personality traits (straight from Omega Proxima 7, I think):

'1. He was an isolated type of human being. He was highly individualistic and chose to grow into a confirmed "shut-in" and unsociable sort of person.

2. As a child, life had been made too easy for him. He bitterly resented thwarting. He always expected to win; he was a very poor loser.

3. He never acquired a philosophic technique for meeting disappointment. Instead of accepting disappointments as a regular and commonplace feature of human existence, he unfailingly resorted to the practice of blaming someone in particular, or his associates as a group, for all his personal difficulties and disappointments.

4. He was given to holding grudges; he was always entertaining the idea of revenge.'

(snip remainder, you can read it above)

It all makes sense now....

Art Guerilla mentioned: '3. i will NEVER understand the 'foul' called when a defensive player establishes position, remains motionless with arms held straight up, and the offensive player jumps into them... 90% of the time, they call a defensive foul, 9% of the time it is a no-call, and 1% of the time they'll call the offensive player... (well, if its not a star player they might...)'

As a former referee, and not a very good one I might add, the defender in the situation you described above has to keep their arms straight up over their heads (think of someone 'reaching for the stars'). If when the offensive player goes up for a shot the defender changes the attitude of their arms momentarily so that their arms are no longer vertical but now extended out at a 45 degree angle or a 60 degree angle, then the referees usually call that a foul on the defender.

Now if the arms are held vertically (90 degree angle) throughout the contact, then the foul should either be on the offensive player or there should be no call.

As for taking your player out when they get 2 fouls in first half, I think it's usually to ensure that the player will have at least 3 fouls when the 2nd half commences. Remember, Guy Lewis kept Clyde Drexler in game against NC State when he had picked up his 3rd foul in first half. Clyde went on & picked up his 4th foul in the 1st half & was a non-factor for rest of the game. IMO, no coach wants to be compared to Guy Lewis, strategy-wise.

Tom in Cent. Ill. remarked about some crazy stuff he listed above this quote: 'if the above sounds like stark lunacy, it is and it is also one of the core beliefs of the American neo-conservative movement'

Tom, I laughed at your excellent post (sometimes it's either laugh or cry), but I think the nutjobs that believe the 'Jesus is coming whether he wants to or not once we set up the conditions outlined in a 1900 year old book' are the 'useful idiots' (to borrow a term ascribed to V.I. Lenin) of the neocons themselves (who are basically a 5th coumn of Likudnicks bent on using these dupes to help Israel become Eretz Israel). IMO, all the core-Neocons (of whatever religious persuasion) care only about Israel & Israeli national security.

There were no scholarship limits back in Coiach Wooden's heyday. He typically had about 18 guys on scholarship. There were dudes who almost never played who went on to 10 year ABA/NBA careers.

Coach Wooden is one of the all-time best coaches, but no one has ever had the kind of talent he had for about a 12 year stretch.

Glenn mentioned: 'It all reads like some caricatured cartoon of a country ruled by compulsive liars and two-bit cons -- like some college freshman's attempt to write a science fiction account of a country ruled by leaders who continuously manipulate the citizenry with the most unabashed, simplistic and transparent lies on the gravest of matters.'

Sometimes I fantasize about being able to go back in time to sometime around 1994 -1995 & I basically have a factual recap of the last 7 years & try to sell it as either a screenplay or a fictional novel.

I keep getting laughed out of peoples offices (in my daydreams) as they guffaw that maybe I need to try & sell it to Marval Comics or something. Historians in 100 years are going to think there was LSD in the water or secret mind hypnosis rays were emanating from the TVs.