Maddenpalooza

Denholm For GM

Couture Flexes Acting Muscles

Spinning Quarters

Lava Dunks

Saving Switzer

I talked to Barry Switzer this week for a Q&A about his guest-starring role on the TNT original series, "Saving Grace" this Monday night. Here's a brief synopsis of the episode entitled, "Do You Love Him?"

Holly Hunter stars in the series as Grace Hanadarko, an intense Oklahoma City police detective with a fiery spirit and audacious lifestyle. In this episode, the door to Grace’s Porsche gets knocked off when a drunk driver slams into it. The impact lets loose thousands of dollars in cash that had been hidden by a previous owner. Switzer is among the owners questioned. When he visits the station, the OCPD police detectives hail him as a hero, except for Butch, the former University of Texas football player. Grace allows Switzer to take a glory ride in the Porsche for old time’s sake.

Switzer called me from his car as he was driving to Oklahoma City from his home in Norman to board a private jet to Las Vegas, a trip he had no idea he would be making when the day started. "I'm calling an audible," said Switzer. "I'm calling my own plays these days."

I had heard for years how great Switzer was as a person and how he would have players eating out of the palm of his hand after meeting him, one of the traits that made him a great recruiter when he was at Oklahoma and helped him win over Cowboys players after the thankless job of taking over for Jimmy Johnson. That was quickly evident during our interview, which was supposed to be no more than 10-15 minutes but dragged on to 30 minutes as he began asking me questions about what college I went to and when I started writing.

By the end of our conversation Switzer had arrived at the airport and told me to call him again, giving me his phone number in the form of the uniform numbers of a couple of his former players. “Do know what number that is?” he asked.

“I do,” I said, reciting the decoded number back to him.“That’s right,” he said. “Call me anytime.”

I'm sure Switzer is more accesible these days, now that he's been out of coaching for 12 years (has it really been that long since the Cowboys last won a playoff game?) but before he left for Sin City I asked him if he would ever consider using his charm in the coaching arena again.

"No way," he said. "If I did that I wouldn't be getting on a private jet to Vegas right now."

Timmys

I've been (or as my Canadian friends say, "bean") to Canada three times in the past month and the first thing I look for when I get off the plane is a Tim Hortons. It isn't hard to find, they're like Starbucks up north and there are usually a couple in the airport. I'm not quite sure what it is, but I'm addicted to their coffee and Timbits, the bite-sized doughnut holes that come in a Happy Meal-like box. It's odd since I'm not a big coffee and doughnut fan, but as soon as I cross the border I turn into a Chief Wiggum from The Simpsons.

Anyway, my most recent trip to Canada was for a motion capture session for EA's NBA LIVE 09. If you’ve never seen or heard of a motion-capture session it’s basically where athletes get stuffed into skin-tight black body suits with dozens of small reflective balls or "markers" attached to them and asked to play basketball in a warehouse-sized studio equipped with more than 40 cameras situated around the court to capture their every move to make the game seem as realistic as possible.

Here are some pictures and videos from EA’s “Summer Camp 2008.”


Rudy Gay and Andre Iguodala engaged in a heated game of NBA Live 09. Rudy picked the Miami Heat, while Andre picked the Oklahoma City "no-names." Why Oklahoma City? "I don't know," said Andre. "I thought I'd do something different."



Brandon Roy, Rudy Gay, Andre Iguodala, Tony Parker and Andrea Bargnani walk off the court after their motion-capture session.


The players practicing their dance moves after watching a computerized version of themslves on the big screen next to the court moving as they move.


Rudy and Andre going at it in their body suits. Believe me, playing the game is more fun than watching them play it.