Derek Bodner’s Blog

With the draft just over 24 hours away, the only thing we can expect is to be surprised. Rumors abound, both with the trading of stars and the drafting of draft picks. There likely isn’t going to be much wrapped up on the trade front before tomorrow evening so now is a time to take a look at what I believe the Sixers should (and shouldn’t) do.

The most common mistake is reaching for a player to fill a positional need, or reaching for a big man because he’s, well….big. You can search back in history to find a litany of busts taken because they’re 7′ tall, from Shawn Bradley to Michael Olowokandi and so on. Big men are far more intriguing and hence get overhyped at this time of the year.

However, another trap to fall into is going squarely with the best player available. While acquiring talent is always encouraged, if you run a system or have stars already in place that will limit the effectiveness of your newly acquired talent, it may be best to go a different way.
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Made a decision Saturday night that I’m worried burned a few bridges. It’s a decision that I had to make, and I’m sure of that, for more than one reason. I’m just worried that I’ve screwed over some people I consider friends, and that they may not understand or might misinterpret why I had to make the choice I did. We’ll see. I’m expecting the worst.

Decided to install Windows Vista today. Don’t worry, I didn’t do anything crazy (like install it as my primary OS). I have WinXP installed as a VM in VMWare-Server, so I cloned the VM, and upgraded that installation of XP to Vista.

I’ve barely used it, but what I can say is:
It looks really nice. The graphics and usability of it is very well done. If you have 1.5+ hours of free time for the install, 10 gigs of free space, and 4 gigs of memory, then this OS is for you (that is, if the compatibility check passes).

Everybody has their opinion on the Sopranos Series Finale on Sunday, here’s mine.

I especially liked the part when …

Yeah, that about sums it up. For a series finale that had as many loose ends to tie up as the Sopranos did, that was a very underwhelming episode to a great series. The Phil Leotardo scene was a great scene. But it was a great scene surrounded by 30 minutes of filler on each side. For every loose end that was tied up (Phil getting whacked), 5 more were opened up (The profession of Meadow’s fiancée and how it conflicts with Tony, the new rat in the family, etc). And this very well may have been David Chase’s intention. We started watching during the life of the family, and we ended watching at just another point in the family, not necessarily the end.
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