Hts121

Do you have the links? Are you referring to the guy who claimed to have been robbed at gunpoint of two cell-phones, some diamond earings, and cash? I believe that was a the corner of Lancshire and Coventry a month or two ago. Same request to ClevelandOhio for links to the crime reports for SH and CH. I'd be interested to see where the spikes (if any) are occuring.

In what way? There has been a push to consolidate our plethora of political subdivisions. Nothing has happened yet, but it will be interesting to see what does happen as local government funds continue to dwindle and expenses rise. Consolidation of services will come first, but complete consolidation between Cleveland and some or many of its inner-ring suburbs is certainly not out of the question. Louisville and Indianapolis have provided some models. I doubt we will ever see a total annexation of Cuyahoga County (1.2 million pop), but who knows what might happen if the dominos start to fall. There are several cities in economic peril - East Cleveland, Garfield Heights, Maple Heights, Warrensville, etc. There are other cities which will likely run into the same problems over the next decade such as Parma, Euclid, South Euclid, Brook Park, etc.

Regionalization could have a big effect on Cleveland's numbers by 2020.

The "creep"? Eh, nevermind... What's disappointing looking at those numbers is seeing how disjointed NEO communities are. 6 of the top 10..... 13 of the top 24..... and 22 of the 50 overall are all NEO communities. Hell.... 12 of the top 50 municipalities listed are Cleveland suburbs! And I bet there are a whole flurry of them falling in line between 50-75. We need to CONSOLIDATE!

^^I never realized Polk was responsible for that video too! I still feel embarrassed everytime I think about it. That was THE cheesiest thing I have ever seen and, frankly, did more damage from a national perspective to the City than his 'hastily made' tourism video..... because nobody outside of Polk (including seemingly the participants in the video) realize it was supposed to be more tongue-in-cheek than a sincer plea

Surf - are you sure you are not mixing up the financing issues with the Schoefield project? Has anything been made public about the financing falling through?..... or are you just relying on your sources for that info?

Listen to this "Fuddy-Duddy"...

^Ohio lacks in promoting the state. We have nothing like "Pure Michigan"

I always had a thing for Sharon Reed too

^Not a bad way of making the glass look half-full

Byron Scott called him the 2nd best player in the draft behind A Davis. Sorry, Byron, I'm not buying you truly believe that. As I said yesterday morning, Waiters was their contingency plan if both Beal and MKG were gone. In their eyes, I truly believe, this was a 3 player draft in which they had the 4th pick

^The Cavs also recieved (or had to "absorb") Kelena Azubuike. Decent role player when healthy, but has only played something like 12 games over the last three years. I'm trying to feel more secure about the Waiters pick. There's plenty to question and scratch your head about, but there's some good news from John Hollinger. He is the ESPN guy that uses somewhat complex formulas to produce an overall statistical rating for each player. He's the one that invented the 'PER'.... for college players, he uses his 'draft rater'. Leading up to this draft, he wrote about how his draft rater has proved over the last decade to be very accurate for wing players. During that timeframe, there have been 8 wing players to rate above 13 over. 5 of those 8 have made an all-star game.... one other, Rudy Gay, will do the same in the near future.... another, Khawi Leonard, just had a solid rookie season with the Spurs.... the one miss was Josh Childress. This year, both Waiters and MKG scored above 13. At the time, before our interest was known, he predicted Waiters would be a 'steal' at pick 8.

Haha. And to think that wasn't even one of those phonetics-typing erros. Swing away fellas... Speaking of 'swinging away'... that is exactly what the Waiters pick is. Definitely the contingency plan as several today speculated should MKG and Beal be gone. A much biggger risk, but an arguably higher ceiling than the other top wings left on the board - Harrison Barnes, Jeremy Lamb, Terrence Ross. Although they had some issues when he first arrived at 'Cuse, Boehiem did call Waiters the most NBA-ready guard he has ever coached. http://blog.syracuse.com/orangebasketball/2012/06/jim_boeheim_dion_waiters_more.html While I hesitate on endorsing the Waiters pick, trading up to grab Zeller was a good move IMO. ACC player of the year. He, not Harrison Barnes or Kendall Marshall, was the leader of that UNC team. Legit 7 footer and runs hard all game. We needed a center and he can fill that role, allowing us to move AV back to his natural 6th man position hopefully. Given the approach, I have to think re-signing Gee is a priority. As of now (and assuming we re-sign Gee and Samuels), our roster looks like this: Irving Waiters Gee Thompson Zeller Varejao Casspi Sloan Gibson Samuels Probably could use another shooter and another big body

^Yeah... too small. I would look for something with at least 100,000 pop

If I "could" relocate...... I would stay right where I am. If I "had to" relocate...... then somewhere along the pacific coast.... nothing too big like LA, SF, or Seattle. I would probably pick a place that is still a city but not a major metropolis. Maybe if I could find a pacific coast equivalent of Charleston SC... something with charm. Keep in mind that we are talking about a place to live, not visit

FINALLY, a reliable and unbiased source for your updates! ;)

Just imagine if a hip-hop venue were announced for this space....

i wouldnt worry about that happening...there is a group of 4 or 5 top tier players that will be taken before waiters. It seems there are indeed some legs to this. I might not have believed it, but now the NBA reporter I respect the most (Wojnarowski from Yahoo) is saying the Cavs' interest is legit. I would guess that they are thinking about (not necessarily locked in on) Waiters at 4 IF MKG and Beal are gone. Word is that Jerry West (Golden State) wants him at 7. I'd say that is a pretty good endorsement. I recall a time when West traded away the Lakers' starting center for a largely unproven 2 guard who was considered a project and that didn't turn out too bad. Waiters' issues with the coaches at 'Cuse does concern me. BScott is a great at getting players with otherwise good attitudes to reach their full potential. I don't see him as a coach who would mesh well with a pre-madonna. Hopefully, if we do take him, the issues last year had more to do with the 'Cuse staff than Waiters. Of course, all of this could be a smokescreen to convince the Bobcats that we are content to stay at 4..... supposedly, the hang up in us moving up to 2 (to take Beal) is that Charlotte wants us to take on Tyrus Thomas' contract (3yrs/$26mill)

Yeah I'm not sure why HTS121 said that. Lets not make, this a bigger deal than it is (or take it any further off topic) as I would hate to think, that some people think, a few venues will associate our city with one particular genre. ;D ....carry on..... I haven't been inside, but I remember discussion when the brand was announced that Horeshoe casinos are typically western themed. I was under the impression that they just toned down that theme for our casino.

^"Horseshoe Casino"...... "Cowboy Rock"....... maybe they can build a giant Honky Tonk on the Jacobs lot (plenty of room for the trailers in the lot directly to the west)....

It's silly season now so close to the draft. A lot of bluffing going on. I still think we stand pat and let MKG fall in our lap. Charlotte appears to be asking too much. Plus, their incentive to move down appears to be that they think they can get TRob at 4...... and, suprise, surprise, word has 'leaked' out of Washington (who doesn't want us to leapfrog them for Beal) that the Wizards are fielding calls from teams interested in moving up to #3 to take TRob. As for Ross, I really like him as a prospect. I have to think we are bringing him in as a fall back plan should Beal and MKG go before us and we don't like our options at 4. Then, we might be interested in letting Portland jump up to 4 to take TRob and we slide down to 6 and 11. We would probably have to give up #24 (or one of our future 1st rounders) along with maybe one of our 2nd rounders to get that done.

I think the consensus at this stage if no trades happen is TRob going #2. A few mocks have them taking Beal, Barnes or MKG, but the vast majority have been trending towards Robinson. It makes too much sense for them (although I suppose that might hint that MJ would go in another direction). They need a leader, toughness, and can't afford to gamble. TRob is probably the safest pick in this draft. Plus, the Bobcats' best player from last year (Gerald Henderson) plays the 2 and Kemba Walker (their top pick from last year) is best suited as a combo-guard. Beal is not a great fit for them. Washington, on the other hand, is probably locked in on Beal. He is the perfect compliment to Wall. They would ask for too much to move up. I think the Cavs stay where they are. I get that some have issues with MKG's shot, but let's not forget that he had the best FG% out of the three wings under consideration - MKG 49% compared to Barnes and Beal who both shot 44%. He also played on an absolutely loaded Kentucky team that spread the ball around quite evenly to the 6-7 guys in their rotation.

Let's try to bring this back on topic (the thing that is listed as the title of the thread). Houston seems to be stockpiling assets to make a play a major piece. They just traded Chase Budinger to Minny for the #18 pick. They already had two picks in the teens and are reportedly in talks with a few teams in the top 10 to acquire more picks. Word is that making a play for DHoward is Option A, with the fall-back plan being trying to coax Ferry (who loves draft picks) out of Josh Smith. In related news, with Budinger going to Minny, has Minny become the new Utah Jazz?

Good investment IMO. I always wanted to buy one of those and fix it up.

^ESPN always seems to be 2 days behind with their TV programming. ESPN.com is a better source of info..... although IMO several NBA reporters have ESPN's NBA reporters beat. The latest is that the Cavs prefer to stand pat at #4 because they don't see enough of a separation between Beal/MKG/Barnes to give Charlotte the #24 to move up. If Charlotte can't find a better deal and indicates a willingness to take one (or maybe both) of our 2nd rounders in lieu of the #24, that could change. ^^And if NBA scouts and general managers saw Melo as someone like Ben Wallace, then he would go in the top 10 without question. 7 footers don't grow on trees (sorry for the cliche) and are such a rare commodity in the NBA that teams routinely reach for them in the draft. I am not saying I wouldn't take Melo on my team.... I just think that there will be much better options at #24 whereas using that pick on Melo would really accomplish nothing more than replacing Ryan Hollins / Semih Erden