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What is a trade deadline?

Dear Sports Fan,

I’ve seen a lot of articles over the last day or two about the NBA trade deadline. What is a trade deadline? Why do sports leagues have them?

Thanks,
Anne

Dear Anne,

It’s hard to define what a trade deadline is without using the words trade or deadline! The trade deadline is a particular date and time after which teams in a professional sports league cannot agree to exchange players or draft picks with other teams. It’s exact date varies by league and by year but each sport has a standard for when it falls in their calendar — half-way through, three-quarters of the way through, etc. It’s an exciting time for sports fans, because, like the day of the draft, it’s a time when fans of every team in the league can be feel hope.

The NBA trade deadline in 2015 is on February 19 at 3 p.m. ET. By this date, most teams will have played between 52 and 55 of their 82 game seasons. They are around two-thirds of the way through the season. The NHL trade deadline this year is on March 2, also at 3 p.m. ET. By then, teams will have played 63 to 67 of their 82 game season. That’s a little farther along — more like 77-82% of the way through the season. On the other end of the spectrum is the NFL, which places its trade deadline right after week eight of 17 or 47% of the way through. What’s the impact of this choice? Well, teams usually decide to be more of a “buyer” meaning they are willing to sacrifice future prospects for players that would be of use this season, or “sellers” meaning they are willing to trade the present for the future, based on how well they’re doing each year. The later a trade deadline falls within a league calendar, the more sure teams will be of their chances to win a championship this season and therefore which role they should play in trades. A later trade deadline creates more and more impactful trades.

Aside from tradition, it’s not entirely clear why teams are not allowed to trade players year-round. I think there is a sense that should be cohesive units before the playoffs begin. During the playoffs, the intensity of emotion and physicality of sports increases. Team allegiance starts to feel more like a matter of identity than choice. Having unfamiliar players on your team at the start of the playoffs or even seeing players move from team to team during the playoffs would break the spell. There’s also the question of competitive balance. Teams might be willing to sacrifice a lot of their future assets on the last day of the season if they were in a position to acquire a player they think could help them make the playoffs or qualify for the next round. Sports leagues understandably may want to protect rash team owners from hurting themselves and their fans for the next five or ten years for a short-term gain.

The day of the trade deadline and the day or two before it are among the most exciting days in sports. If the team a fan roots for is terrible, by halfway to four fifths of the way through the season, its fans are probably a little sick of watching it play. At trade deadline time, the team can interest them again by making moves to get better next season. For fans of teams that seem like they have a chance to win a championship, it’s even more exciting to speculate and then witness what the team does to make itself better for its playoff run. Every fan likes to think of themselves not only as an athlete on their favorite team, the coach of their favorite team, but also the general manager too! Speculating about trades before the trade deadline is an exercise in imagination. What player from an opposing team would fit best with your favorite team? Who could your team part with without losing their essence?

Trade deadline day is covered obsessively online, primarily on Twitter, and also live on TV. Sports channels are happy to devote time during a week-day to a panel of “experts” who blab and blab all day about the trades as they are reported to the league office and the media. The excitement (I know I sound a little cynical about this, but I do get really excited too) peaks right around the time of the deadline and for a few hours later as information about trades which were executed right before the deadline comes out through the media to fans.

If your colleagues are more distracted on February 19 or March 2 than they normally are, you’ll know why!

Thanks for asking,
Ezra Fischer

Sports Forecast for Wednesday, February 18, 2015

Sports is no fun if you don’t know what’s going on. Here’s what’s going on: In today’s segment, I covered:

Champions Leagues Soccer – Real Madrid at Schalke 04, 2:45 p.m. ET on Fox Sports 1.
NHL Hockey – Detroit Red Wings at Chicago Blackhawks, 7:30 p.m. ET on NBC Sports Network.
NHL Hockey – Los Angeles Kings at Colorado Avalanche, 10 p.m. ET on NBC Sports Network.
NCAA Basketball – North Carolina at Duke, 9 p.m. ET on ESPN.
And more!

For email subscribers, click here to get the audio.

You can subscribe to all Dear Sports Fan podcasts by following this link. Music by Jesse Fischer.

What happened on Tuesday, February 17, 2015?

Chelsea leave Paris happy: Two legged playoffs like the Champions League are such that the visiting team is happy to come away with a tie in the first game, especially if it’s not a scoreless tie. This is because the first tie-breaker in case the two teams are even on goals after their second game is how many goals the team scored as a visitor. After yesterday’s 1-1 tie against PSG, Chelsea has the upper hand.
Line: When is a tie a win? When it’s the first half of a two-leg playoff.
5-1 but not that lopsided: The Nashville Predators beat the San Jose Sharks 5-1 last night but the game was not nearly as lopsided as it appears from that score. Nashville’s goalie, Pekke Rinne, made 42 saves. That’s a lot of saves! If the Predators didn’t have one of the best goalies in the world on their team, they still may have won, but the score would probably have been 5-3 or 5-4.
Line: Having a great goalie is the most important thing in hockey.
St. John’s Law: They may not quite be up to the standard of Murphy, but it did seem like anything that could go wrong for St. John’s last night in their game against Georgetown, did. The St. John’s team ended the game limping and losing, 79-57.
Line: Coming in with a three game winning streak, I expected more from St. John’s.

2015: North Carolina vs. Duke

In 2015 Dear Sports Fan will be previewing the biggest sporting event of the year in each of the 50 states in the United States plus the district of Columbia. Follow along with us on our interactive 2015 US Map.

North Carolina — North Carolina vs. Duke

College Basketball — February 18, 2015 — 9 p.m. ET on ESPN. Also, March 7, 2015.

It may seem funny that we chose a regular season college basketball game as the biggest sports event in North Carolina for 2015. The thing is… we’re right. There is no bigger sporting event in North Carolina than when Duke University and the University of North Carolina play in men’s college basketball. Indeed, it would be easy to make the case that there’s no bigger college basketball game all year than when these two teams play.

It’s said that familiarity breeds contempt and Duke and North Carolina are a prime example of this. The two schools are only eight miles apart and have played against each other at least two times a year since 1920. For people who live in North Carolina, it’s hard to remain uncommitted to one side or another. You’re either a Blue Devil (Duke supporter) or you bleed Tar-Heel Blue (North Carolina’s nickname is the Tar Heels and they wear baby blue but don’t call it that… 😉 ) It’s a rivalry that cuts through race, class, and family. The Wikipedia article on the rivalry has two wonderful quotes which together paint a wonderful picture of sports antipathy. The first is from Will Blythe’s book about the rivalry, To Hate Like This Is to Be Happy Forever:

To legions of otherwise reasonable adults, it is a conflict that surpasses sports; it is locals against outsiders, elitists against populists, even good against evil… The rivalry may be a way of aligning oneself with larger philosophic ideals.

The other quote is from former U.S. Congressperson Brad Miller, who actually told an AP reporter this in 2012:

If Duke was playing against the Taliban, then I’d have to pull for the Taliban.

What’s the plot?

With Duke and North Carolina, there’s a macro plot about the rivalry as a whole and a micro plot about each edition. We’ll start macro. Like many great college rivalries, the one between Duke and North Carolina can be characterized easily as a rich private school against a public school. Duke is the elite, private school. If you know it mostly for its sports teams or don’t know much about it at all, it’s easy to not realize just how elite it is. Duke accepts only 10% of its undergraduate applicants and 4% of its graduate level applicants. It’s regularly listed as one of the top ten colleges in the country by all sorts of organizations that do that type of ranking. It has an enormous endowment — over $7 billion — and it spends a lot too — over a billion dollars in 2012 on research alone! Duke students and alumni are quite reasonably proud of their school and that pride translates for many of them into obsessive rooting for their school’s sports teams, men’s basketball first and foremost. North Carolina plays the role of the public school. The university is, indeed, a public school, as you can tell from its size — 18,000 undergrads and 12,000 graduate students compared to Duke’s 6,500 and 8,000 — and from its admission stats, which are much more forgiving than Duke’s. Other than that though, the mantle of public schools falls a little uncomfortably on North Carolina’s shoulders. Like Duke, North Carolina is sneaky elite when it comes to academics. North Carolina is consistently sited as one of the top five public universities in the country and claims its place as one of the “public ivies.”

Likewise in basketball, the similarities between the two schools are greater than their differences. They both have incredible histories of winning with no apparent plans to stop any time soon. They are number three and four in all-time wins. Together, they account for nine championships and 33 Final Four appearances. Since the beginning of the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) that they both play in, the two teams have won 79% of the regular season titles and 59% of the conference tournaments. They both win. A lot. They’ve also been lucky enough to have two of the top three most well regarded coaches of all time. Dean Smith, who just died recently, coached at North Carolina for 36 years. My favorite story about him, which illustrates his stature and character the best, is that he was so well loved and respected by his former players, including basketball greats in their own right like Michael Jordan and Larry Brown among others, that they continued to call Smith for advice on any important life decision, well into their forties, fifties, and even sixties. Smith would get calls from former players asking for his advice on engagements, house purchases, etc. Duke’s current coach, Mike Krzyzewski is the current holder of the best coach in basketball mantle. He’s coached for Duke since 1980 and, with 932 victories, is the all-time winningest coach. Although he’s rejected countless offers to coach in the NBA, he has coached the USA Basketball team for the last ten years. In a rare but touching show of inter-rivalry solidarity, many Duke fans will be wearing a shirt honoring their late rival, Dean Smith.

This year, Duke is the more highly regarded and ranked team. Duke is currently 21-3 and ranked fourth in the country. North Carolina is no slouch themselves, but they are significantly behind at 18-7 and ranked 15th. Duke is coming off five straight victories. North Carolina has actually lost three of their last four games although two of those losses came in back to back games against highly ranked Louisville and Virginia.

Who are the characters?

Roy Williams — Roy Williams is the current coach of the North Carolina Tar Heels. Williams was not the direct successor of legendary Coach Dean Smith, but he’s the first one who’s stuck. He was born and grew up in North Carolina and went to the University of North Carolina where he played freshman basketball and volunteered for the Varsity team. After graduation, he took a job as a high school coach nearby and after five years there, returned to become an Assistant Coach under Smith at UNC. He stayed for ten years before striking off on his own to become the head coach of the University of Kansas. At Kansas, Williams succeeded admirably, taking the team to four Final Fours and losing two National Championship games. Still, when the North Carolina job opened up in 2003, Williams jumped at it. In his twelve years coaching for UNC, he’s succeeded even more than at at Kansas — three Final Fours and two National Championship victories. He may still live in the shadow of his one time mentor, but he’s comfortable there.

Jahlil Okafor — For years, Duke seemed to be a hold-out against the trend of recruiting athletes of such promise that they were likely to remain in college for only the one year that is required until they turn professional and enter the NBA draft. Jahlil Okafor is exhibit A that that is no longer a reality. Okafor is likely to be the first overall pick of the NBA draft for this year. He’s listed at 6’11 and 270 pounds. Guys that big don’t grow on trees (they’re so big, perhaps it would be more likely for trees to grow on them?) and to be as polished an offensive player as Okafor is extraordinarily rare. Okafor is deadly when he gets the ball around the basket. Watch for Duke to try to get the ball to him close to the basket so he can overpower or out-skill his defender. Okafor’s only weakness is that he’s not a great defender. North Carolina may try to attack him on that end and hope that the refs call a few fouls on him, forcing Duke to limit his playing time.

Who’s going to win?

Duke. Duke should win. They have the best player on the court and the best coach on the sidelines. It is a rivalry though and rivalries bring out strange performances, especially from college kids, so who really knows?

What happened on Monday, February 16, 2015?

New York Rivalry on ice: For the first season in a long time, the New York Rangers and New York Islanders are both very good. Regardless of record, over the years their rivalry has remained strong. Now it’s even better. Last night’s game went back and forth and back and forth until finally the Rangers won 6-5.
Line: When the Islanders were terrible, they seemed to always get up to play the Rangers. Now that they’re both good, it’s pretty even.
So close, but no tea: The English FA cup is a psychological challenge for top-flight teams like Manchester United. Instead of playing against equals, they frequently play against teams, like Preston North End, which plays in League One, the third tier league in the country. The mind-game goes like this — “it’s not going to be hard to win, we should win, uh oh, what if we don’t win, we have to win!!” This only gets worse, when, like happened yesterday, the underdog scores a goal first. Preston North End couldn’t hold back the flood of Manchester United forever, and finally gave way to a barrage of goals in the second half to lose 3-1.
Line: These David and Goliath games seem to follow a pattern with David threatening but Goliath almost always winning in the end.
West Virginia wins a thriller: There was a time when West Virginia’s men’s college basketball team made the NCAA tournament almost every year behind coach Bob Huggins. That’s not the case anymore — it’s actually been three years since they played in March Madness. This looks like it will be their comeback year. The West Virginia team is ranked 23rd in the country and just beat the number eight team, the Kansas Jayhawks, last night in a thriller of a game. West Virginia went up by a point with four seconds left and then defended a last second attempt by Kansas to win the game.
Line: The NBA has higher quality players but it’s hard to match the joy of watching a college team win a close game.

Sports Forecast for Tuesday, February 17, 2015

Sports is no fun if you don’t know what’s going on. Here’s what’s going on: In today’s segment, I covered:

Champions Leagues Soccer – Chelsea at PSG, 2:45 p.m. ET on Fox Sports 1.
NHL Hockey – San Jose Sharks at Nashville Predators, 8 p.m. ET on regional cable.
NCAA Basketball – St. John’s at Georgetown, 7 p.m. ET on Fox Sports 1.
And more!

For email subscribers, click here to get the audio.

You can subscribe to all Dear Sports Fan podcasts by following this link. Music by Jesse Fischer.

What happened on Sunday, February 15, 2015?

The NBA All-Star Game: That’s the most that can be said about it, really. It happened. The West beat the East, 163-158, in a game that (as always) was more of an offensive exhibition than actual basketball. Russell Westbrook scored 41 points and won the MVP award but the real MVPs of the game were former President Bill Clinton and retired NBA player Dikembe Mutombo who sat together and generally seemed like they were having a great time.
Line: The NBA All-Star game is fun, I guess, but without real competition, basketball isn’t really worth watching.
USA Rugby teases viewers: Playing at home in the one stop of the Rugby World Series in the United States, the USA Rugby Sevens team made the semifinals before hitting a wall. In their semi-final game against New Zealand, the USA team jumped out to a 7-0 lead before letting up (or more likely, just getting outclassed) and eventually losing 26-12. In the third place game, the United States was shut out by South Africa, 31-0. Fiji won the tournament, beating New Zealand 35-19.
Line: It figures that the US team plays great when virtually no one is watching and then stinks up the joint on Sunday when they are on NBC.
Chicago wins in a shootout: No, it’s not prohibition — we’re talking about a hockey shootout. In the nationally televised NBC game of the week, the Chicago Blackhawks played a tight, 1-1 game against the Pittsburgh Penguins. In the shootout to decide the game, Chicago’s Patrick Kane, Jonathan Toews, and Patrick Sharp each scored against the Penguins goalie, Marc-Andre Fleury. The loss left Fleury, who usually stops over 90% of shootout attempts against him, hopping mad.
Line: The shootout is not the best way to decide a hockey game because it’s pretty much a separate skill, but it can be extremely entertaining.

Should you watch NBA All-Star Weekend? What part?

All-Star games are not always a highlight of a sports season. In fact, they’re often so mundane that people wonder why sports leagues even bother to have All-Star games. The NBA All-Star weekend is sometimes an exception to that rule. It’s a star-studded, moderately action packed weekend of events that has controversially been dubbed “Black Thanksgiving” by David Aldridge in a CNN article which seems to have been removed from their archives. In the article, Aldridge quoted Todd Boyd, a professor of critical studies at USC as saying that “NBA All-Star weekend has turned into a celebration of African American culture.” Whether you’re black, red, yellow, brown, or white, a basketball fan or a non-sports fan, a fashionista or music fan, there’s probably something for you to enjoy this weekend. This guide should help you decide what parts of the weekend will be most or least interesting.

Celebrity Game

Friday, February 13 at 7 p.m. ET on ESPN.

What is this?

It’s a basketball game played by a very strange mix of musicians, actors, general celebrities, retired NBA players, and current WNBA players. It’s… sometimes fun to watch. As opposed to the actual All-Star game, the people playing in this game usually do really want to win. They were chosen in part because they are competitive, entertaining, and at least kind of know how to play basketball.

Who plays in it?

The game has been dominated (no joke, dominated) over the past few years by Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan. He’s missing this year, so I’m most excited to see the following three people play in the celebrity game:

Paralympic athlete and former high school basketball player Blake Leeper. Leeper was born with both knees missing below the knee and has been using prosthetics since he was nine years old.
Robert Pera, the owner of the Memphis Grizzlies. At 36, Pera is one of the world’s youngest billionaires. I think this is probably the first time an NBA owner has played during All-Star weekend.
Mo’ne Davis!!! That’s right! The first girl to record a win (and pitch a shut-out) in the Little League World Series is going to be on the court! My guess is that she’ll mop the floor with most of the players she faces. After all, at 13, she’s already on a high school varsity basketball team and has talked publicly of wanting to play in college for the University of Connecticut.

Watch this if…?

Watch this if you enjoy pomp, circumstance, alley-oops, and thunderous dunks. Watch it if you want to see the greatest NBA players of our day break a sweat playing something that vaguely resembles basketball.

What happened on Thursday, February 12, 2015?

Ahead early: Sometimes having an early lead in hockey means you run away with a game, like the St. Louis Blues did in their 6-3 win over the Tampa Bay Lightning. Sometimes it means you let in four goals in the third period and need overtime to edge your opponent. That was the situation for the Pittsburgh Penguins in their game against the Ottawa Senators, which they eventually won 5-4 in the shootout.
Line: I’d rather have the lead than not, but sometimes it means you get sloppy.
Rose comes up big: Just in time for Valentine’s Day weekend, Chicago Bulls guard Derek Rose played his best game of the year, scoring 30 points and helping the Bulls beat the Cleveland Cavaliers 113-98 in the last game before the all-star break. One fun thing about the Bulls is that it seems like the more they want to win a game, the better they play. That’s a surprisingly rare characteristic, even for a professional sports team.
Line: I think the Bulls really wanted to win that game to make a statement. And when they want to, they usually win.
Giant win for Anna Fenninger: The women’s competitions at the Alpine World Championships had been dominated by Slovenian Tina Maze and her attempt to make history by medaling in all five events. That ended yesterday when Maze failed to medal in the Giant Slalom competition, which Austrian Anna Fenninger won. All of a sudden people noticed that Fenninger actually has as many medals and as many golds as Maze — two golds and one other medal.
Line: With one race left, Fenninger and Maze are tied. We’ll see what happens in the slalom.

Sports Forecast for Friday, February 13, 2015

Sports is no fun if you don’t know what’s going on. Here’s what’s going on: In today’s segment, I covered:

International Soccer – United States at England, 3 p.m. ET on Fox Sports 1.
NHL Hockey – Boston Bruins at Vancouver Canucks, 10 p.m. ET on regional cable.
NBA All-Star Weekend, 7 p.m. ET on EPSN and 9 p.m. ET on TNT.
Skiing – Alpine World Championships in Beaver Creek, Colorado, 4 p.m. ET on NBC Sports Network.
Rugby – USA Sevens Rugby World Series at 7:30 p.m. ET on Universal Sports Network. I wrote a whole article about this!
And more!

For email subscribers, click here to get the audio.

You can subscribe to all Dear Sports Fan podcasts by following this link. Music by Jesse Fischer.