Cleveland Rocks

Anybody who has seen a single episode of the Drew Carey Show has unfortunately heard the worst intro song in the history of sitcom television, and thus sat through at least a couple minutes of one of the worst TV shows created since M*A*S*H, or at least since SKIN made its debut last night on MTV. "Cleveland Rocks" is a complete lie. That's why the Browns moved to Baltimore, LeBron moved to Miami and everyone with a job moved out of Ohio, or at the very least, out of Cuyahoga County, even the Bone Thugs. But, there is often times a silver lining to the word Cleveland when added into someone's name. For example, Grover Cleveland is the only American President ever to serve two terms (22nd and 24th president), and still managed to accomplish absolutely nothing while in office. Kudos to you, Grover. Also, that spinoff, lisp-ridden foil character from Family Guy got his own show, which garnered worse ratings than The Nanny, and eventually collapsed before it ever really started. In the case of DePaul basketball, there is another young, promising Cleveland making waves in the Big East, and his name is Cleveland Melvin. However, much like the aforementioned people and places, DePaul basketball sucks.

It's safe to say that Oliver Purnell's plan at DePaul hasn't exactly "took off" in Rosemont, which is strikingly ironic considering how close the multi-purpose venue is to the O'Hare airport. In fact, the only time I have heard the word "Demon" mentioned recently came when a good friend of mine, whom we will call El Don, referred to his cabin mates on a Wisconsin ski trip as "sexy, little demons". But that is neither here nor there. The fact of the matter is that DePaul, although utterly atrocious and currently winless in the Big East, may still boast the Freshman of the Year in Baltimore native, Cleveland Melvin. "My favorite Melvin" is currently averaging 14.2 PPG on the year as a whole and has even managed to get even more buckets during DePaul's games in the best collegiate basketball conference in America (22.8 PPG in conference play). Melvin is also managing to pull down nearly 5 boards per game from the forward position and is somehow averaging below 1 helper per game (0.6 APG, 11 total on the season). Now that's DePaul basketball, low and behold.

Still, Cleveland's immense potential as a Freshman in the Big East can't go without being noticed. He's already dropped 29 on JT-triple sticks' G-town Hoyas and had his best game of the year (25 and 12) against Kemba Walker's UCONN Huskies. With DePaul going into the Bradley Center to face Marquette tonight, Melvin has a chance to make a Hamilton Porter-type splash in the Big East by knocking off an overachieving MU squad, ceremoniously kicking off this Chicago vs. Wisconsin week on the right foot. Remember, DePaul broke its "running the table in reverse" streak in the Big East against Marquette last year, thoroughly embarrassing the Golden Eagles. Will any of you watch this game? Eh, probably not. Hell, I'm not going to waste a perfectly good Tuesday night watching DePaul basketball. But, check the box score tomorrow and it might smell like Cleveland in the air, or maybe that's just the smell of unemployment.

As for Pick of the Day, in one of the most entertaining and spurt-heavy games I have ever witnessed, Pitt knocked off Syracuse at home by 8 (2 more than the spread), and gave the Orange, and the Pulse Man their 1st and 33rd losses of the season respectively. For tonight, the Pulse Man likes Illinois on the moneyline (-180) at home and coming off consecutive losses against Draymond "Trimspa" Green and Sparty. I-L-L.

Pick of the Day: Illinois (moneyline) vs. Michigan St.- ILLINOIS

Record:(46-33-0)

Don't forget to email your thoughts, opinions, predictions or lashings for this weekend's Packer/Bear game to chicagosportsnoise@gmail.com.

Now I'm done. Rack me

Frost