We ended up winning the Roots basketball tournament. There were some good teams in it with some newer NBA players and a bunch of overseas/college players. It was a double elimination tournament and we got through our first three games no problem. We ended up facing the team we played in the Championship the year before, 2 Legit. We played horrible and they eneded up beating us in a close game. Fortunately for us we were pretty deep in the winners bracket already. We had to play one more game and win and then we would goto the championship.

We won our semifinals game and we faced 2 Legit in the Championship. Now since we lost earlier, and they hadnt lost yet, we had to beat them twice to win. We won the first game by like 15 or 20 and then the second game was insane. I almost got thrown out of the gym the first game because there was a referee who hated me and wanted to throw me out for ridiculous shit. I’ll spare the details of everything because its just something I dont want to get into, but basically this referee was trying to punk me, telling me if I didnt sit down and stay seated I would get a technical. He disrespected me pretty bad. At halftime of the first game I went to talk to him in the referee room to straighten it out and he told me to get the hell out of there and what was I doing in there and everything. Wow. I was pretty furious at this point because not 1) did he disrespect me on the court during the game and 2) when I tried to approach him about it during halftime he disrespected me by not even giving me the time of day to talk to him about what he was so upset for. There’s more to the story but I’ll leave it at that.

For the rest of the Championship games (Second Half of 1 and Game 2) I didn’t sit on the bench but a row behind it. I took off my coaching badge they gave us so I couldn’t penalize the team and get them a technical foul or anything. Let me get on to the second game. It was amazing. The refs were out to get us the whole time. They didnt call a single foul for us and the other team got the most ridiculous calls. There were a lot of people betting on the games. I mean A LOT OF PEOPLE. There were probably 50-100 people in the gym that had placed bets on the game and some really big bets. I definitely think something fishy was going on with the refereeing and that maybe they were getting paid to throw the game in some way. It was pretty crazy.

We were down 4 points with 40 seconds left and ended up coming back and winning the game somehow. We were down 1 with about 10 seconds left and hit an And 1 to go up 2. We defended the shot well and they missed a jumper and we won the game. During the last minute guys were going crazy. Some guys ran out onto the court or into the team huddles. One guy even ran onto the court during a timeout and kicked the ball because of the refs and he had bet on the game. It was pretty intense and we were happy we won. My dad even asked me for $100 to bet on the first game and he won some money betting although he never bets on anything. Haha. I’ll try to find some pictures because I know there are some and then I will post them up here.

Aside from that poker hasn’t been going to well. Im changing my game around and trying to think differently about different situations and I think things will start turning around soon. The FTOPS is here (Full Tilt Online Poker Series.) Hopefully I can be lucky enough to run good in a big event and win a ton of money. We will see how that goes. My buddy cane is actually at the final table of the 6 max Shootout right now with first being 45k. I will let you guys know how he does in it.

Poker wise I can’t really say much is going on. I’ve been playing almost every night all the big tournaments and can’t really seem to get anything going. I’ve been getting my money in good for the most part so hopefully I can continue playing well and things will turn around. It just takes a spark to get on a heater… I think. I’ve never actually been on a “heater” so hopefully I can get on one soon =)

I’ve been working out everyday and I actually started a 30 day ban on drinking. I told myself I wouldn’t drink for 30 days so that’s what I plan on doing. My buddy Brian has gone over a year and change without drinking, so I know I can do it. I want to eat better too. I don’t eat that bad right now but I do splurge sometimes and eat ice cream real late and night and other things that cant be good for me if I’m trying to cut down on body fat and everything. I’m definitely not fat but I’m trying to get more cut up and lose my body fat. I’m going to talk to the trainers in my gym and have a fitness test soon so I can see the actual body fat I have and everything else I need to know.

Hmm.. When all my buddies were down for the Roots tournament we went out a couple nights. One night we all went to downtown Ft Lauderdale and then the next night me and my buddy Josh (aka Pep…Played basketball for UCF now plays professionally in Japan) met up with Stu, Hans, John and Tim at Prive on South beach. Prive was alright. The club was actually pretty small and the people just all seemed stuck up. The staff seemed stuck up as well. I’m not sure what I think about South Beach but it appears that a lot of people just think they are better than everyone and there is definitely something in the air. Pep and I drank a little (This was the night before of my 30 days no drinking) and had a good time hanging out with everyone. Stu and everyone left early because people got too drunk and me and Pep hung out for a while. We left around 4:30-5 and made it home.

I guess I will leave this post at that. Sorry it’s just a bunch of random thoughts and things that have been going on lately all wrapped into one. Cane is still in and there are still 6 people left.

On a final note, the greatest rapper ever is going to be coming out with a new album sometime. Maybe not in this year but soon. Jay-z. Here’s a clip from the end of Kanye’s show in NYC last night when Hov came out to sing a verse of a song that might be on The Blueprint 3.