MICHAEL ATCHISON

Introductory Column

Michael Atchison

Hello, readers. Welcome to my world, a shadowy place where Mizzou basketball is in season twelve months a year. A place with a rumpus room covered in the gray Tartan from the old Hearnes Center floor. John Brown’s 50 hangs from the rafters. So does Derrick Chievous’ 3. There are photos from vacations to Moss Point, Mississippi and Shelbyville, Missouri. There’s a whole wing dedicated to Detroit. Sometimes, Mark Atkins and Clarence Gilbert stop by to shoot four-pointers. There’s a jukebox with Mahlon Aldridge’s greatest hits, and newer works by guys like Bob Costas, Kevin Harlan and Mike Kelly (“Splash!” and “Paulding with the Flush!” are new faves). There’s a little agony over there where Tyus Edney’s shot went in and some ecstasy over here where Eric Piatkowski’s rimmed out. The place is a little weird and a little wonderful, and over in the corner is a computer and keyboard, which brings us to this next part.

Through the auspices of Nick Witthaus, proprietor of our jittery powder keg of a website, I’ll periodically fill this tiny corner of the Internet with one or two thousand words on Missouri basketball. I’ll offer observations, ruminations, meditations, prognostications and hallucinations on the Tigers and their rivals. We’ll reflect on the past, analyze the present and gaze into the future. We’ll waste a lot of time, starting three paragraphs from now.

Before we begin, a disclaimer: Beyond an invitation from the publisher, I have no particular qualification to be here. I don’t profess to know basketball better than Quin Snyder or any other coach in the league, thus disqualifying myself from a career in talk radio. The closest I have come to playing with or against Big 12 caliber talent was in the Jefferson Elementary School league, where I shared the court with Jeff Gueldner, who went on to play with Danny Manning on the 1988 national champs (best eleven-year-old shooter I’ve ever seen). Suffice it to say that I’m a fan, an observer, a raconteur, a philanthropist and a pathological and inveterate liar. Read at your own risk.

Most of the time, the idea will be to take one or two topics and stretch them out. But for this inaugural edition, let’s just toss a few thoughts out Larry King-style and see what sticks.

Random Thoughts, Interhoop style: In between a sluggish start and a sloppy finish, the Tigers played 20 minutes of stellar basketball in their exhibition debut. The most impressive thing? The passing. From the perimeter to the post, back out to the top, high/low, along the baseline, ahead on the break, off the backboard (slick, Jim), or to a cutter in the lane, this team shares the ball and cares little about who scores. The irony, of course, is that the selflessness will help everyone score more. It’s also a joy to watch. . . . OK, who wants to fight Linas Kleiza? Anyone? Anyone? The guy is like a grizzly bear without the cuddly fur. . . . Over the past few years, strength and conditioning coach Jeff Watkinson has helped make skinny freshmen stout and chubby ones chiseled. It’s hard to imagine what he’ll do with Kleiza and fellow frosh Thomas Gardner, who already look like they’ve been in his weight room for four years. . . . Anyone else impressed by Jason Conley’s all-business demeanor? Even while he continues to bide his time waiting to play, the guy exudes a level-headed cool on the bench in his suit and tie, always in the huddle, always into the game. Once he hits the floor on December 21, he’ll add talent and maturity to a team that already has each in spades. . . . The relative ease of the Interhoop victory is especially pleasing given that teams often look like train wrecks in exhibition openers. A year ago, the Tigers needed five points in the last fifteen seconds just to get to overtime with EA Sports before sweating out a one-point win. . . . Recently, I caught a little of the Tigers’ 2001 win over Iowa on ESPN Classic and found myself feeling nostalgic for Wesley Stokes and his coiffure. Luckily, we’ll all be able to get a fix when Wes and his San Diego State team play Ohio State on ESPN2 on November 24.

Scratching my head: How does Arthur Johnson not make the list of 30 preseason Naismith Award candidates? He’s the media’s pick for Big 12 player of the year, and most every preseason rag lists him as third-team All-America or better. Yet six other Big 12 players appear on the Naismith list, as do (among others) Cal big man Amit Tamir and Duke senior guard Chris Duhon. Tamir is a nice player, but Johnson would devour him like a Tokyo skyscraper in a Godzilla flick. As for Duhon, after a while doesn’t the annual cycle of preseason hardware and postseason shut-outs perform a disservice to the guy? Three years and 100+ games into his career, Duhon has shown himself to be a good-to-very good player who doesn’t shoot terribly well and who has never averaged double figures as a scorer. Put him on any other team in the nation and he is listed as an all-conference candidate, but he doesn’t get a sniff at a national award.

Toward triple digits: Some time this season, Quin Snyder – who enters the year with an 84-49 career record – should become just the fourth coach to lead the Missouri Tigers to 100 victories. At his current pace, Snyder will pass George Edwards (181 victories) for third place on the all-time Mizzou wins list in the 2007-08 season, and he’ll overtake second-place Sparky Stalcup (195) the following year. After that comes Norm Stewart’s 634 wins – in 2029-30. It could be a very Jetsons world by then.

Seniority: It has been a long time since Mizzou possessed a critical mass of seniors like the current group. With four seniors expected to contribute and three penciled in to the starting five, the Tigers have veteran talent like no team in a decade. Ten years ago, Missouri leaned on three senior starters – Melvin Booker, Jevon Crudup and Lamont Frazier – and four senior reserves in a season that began with negligible expectations and ended in the history books. Coming off a year in which they finished seventh in the Big 8, no one expected much from the Missouri Tigers, despite their improbable triumph in the 1993 conference tournament. But a bevy of newcomers, paced by Kelly Thames, Paul O’Liney and Julian Winfield, quickly assimilated with the veterans, ran through the conference undefeated, claimed a number one seed in the NCAA Tournament and advanced to the Elite Eight. Substitute new names like Kleiza, Conley and Gardner, and you start to wonder whether history might repeat itself. Still, history could be improved upon, starting with one to three more tournament wins.

From the Department of Absurdity: Sometimes in the night’s small hours, when sleep won’t come, the mind wanders and ponders the important questions, like this one. If all the Tigers of yore were divided into groups by surname and then played a mythical tournament, who would win? The answer? The Smiths. In a rout. Despite the ordinary name, Mizzou’s Smiths are no ordinary bunch. Six Smiths have earned letters at Mizzou, and four – Lionel, Henry, Willie and Doug – led their teams in scoring a total of six times, while Willie and Doug combined to win three conference player of the year awards. Pleasant Smith (a WWII-era star and one of the toughest competitors ever) rounds out the starting five, while sixth man Reggie, who played on three NCAA Tournament teams, two Big 8 Tournament victors and the undefeated 1994 conference champs, provides a defensive spark off the bench. The only other group to even field a starting five is the six-member Team Johnson, led by current star Arthur and by Clay, a late 1970’s standout who bridged the Willie Smith and Stipo/Sundvold years. The remaining Johnsons are a scrappy bunch, but they can’t quite match the Smiths’ firepower. Final score: Smiths 88 Johnsons 73.

The championship game of the three-on-three tournament was slated to pit the Browns (John, Booker and Kenny) against the Fraziers (Ricky, Gary and Lamont). Unfortunately, it was called on account of my mind wandering off to some equally perplexing question.

That’s all for now. Up next: Thoughts on Jimmy McKinney and the new recruiting class.