- Rockets expressed interest in Casspi this week before Brooks' availability. With no landing spot, Casspi's buyout talks w/Cavs were scrapped
@ESPNSteinLineMarc Stein
- Here’s Frank Isola of the New York Daily News on the possible end of Jason Kidd’s days as a starter: “Mike Woodson removed the struggling veteran from the starting lineup prior to last night’s 96-88 victory over the Washington Wizards and made Kidd the back-up point guard, the role Kidd expected to play when he signed a three year contract last July. Woodson did not say the move is permanent but considering that Kidd had scored a total of 30 points in 11 games last month, the Knicks can’t survive without getting more production from the shooting guard position. ‘I didn’t come in this league as a scorer,’ Kidd joked, ‘and it doesn’t look like I’m going to leave as a scorer.’ “
More bad news on the Andrew Bynum front, via John N. Mitchell of the Philadelphia Inquirer: “The 76ers and center Andrew Bynum are considering arthroscopic surgery on the player’s right knee in order to clean out loose cartilage, a procedure that could likely end the season for the center they traded so many young assets to acquire, according to sources with knowledge of the situation. Bynum suffered a setback in the form of swelling in his right knee following his participation in a five-on-five scrimmage, first reported in The Inquirer Feb. 22. While the Sixers have been unable to practice recently due to their schedule, Bynum would not have been able to participate due to the swelling in his knee, which was also first reported by The Inquirer. Bynum said his left knee ‘feels good.’ Following practice at Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine on Friday, Bynum acknowledged that his season might in fact be over. ‘Now it’s getting a little late, so I really don’t know,’ Bynum said when asked if he were considering sitting out the final two months of the 76ers season. ‘I played in one scrimmage and [I have] a four- to five-day setback,’ Bynum said.”
- Eric Prisbell of USA Today has an awesome feature on Kansas’ Ben McLemore, who is projected to go pretty high in the NBA draft. Here’s a taste: “Unlike many of today’s top players, McLemore was not showered with adulation or anointed a future star from the time he was an adolescent. Rather than obsess over national player rankings, phenom camp invitations or third-party handlers, McLemore focused on more fundamental concerns amid one of the poorest urban communities in Missouri: finding food. Says McLemore: ‘It’s hard to play basketball when nothing is inside of you.’ “
Another cool piece comes from Joshua Brustein at the New York Times, on John Hollinger, formerly of ESPN and now of the Grizzlies’ front office: “Hollinger said that his feelings about the Grizzlies players had not changed after having joined the team, although he would not comment on the players he had traded. The one thing he would say was that [Tayshaun] Prince learned the Grizzlies playbook in “like five minutes.” ‘There’s no analytic for that; he was just plug and play,’ he said. Hollinger said that he has had little opportunity to work with the players who are currently on the team, because he showed up in the middle of the season and was initially focused on player transactions. ‘It was a little hard to jump in and start making demands or whatever,’ he said. ‘So I think our approach has probably been a little cautious. There hasn’t been a lot of opportunity to implement deep analytic concepts at this point.’ “
- Free agent guard Delonte West is scheduled to report to the Texas Legends of D-League on Monday, league source tells Y! Sports.
@WojYahooNBAAdrian Wojnarowski
- Looks like the Rockets may have at least a temporary solution to the Royce White situation. Here’s Ric Bucher of CSN Bay Area, via Sulia: “How I’d love to be at the Santa Cruz Warriors vs. Rio Valley Grande Vipers NBADL tilt tonight. Royce White is making the 34-hour drive in an RV because of his anxiety issues to play this one game for the Vipers and then turning around and making the 34-hour drive right back. Word in Vipers’ circles is that his nickname is now “Winnebago.” Word also is that he has multiple drivers to keep the RV rolling but that it’s still, basically, a week-long adventure to play one minor-league game.”
- Metta World Peace recently had a foul retroactively upgraded to a flagrant 2. Here’s what he had to say on the matter, via Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times: “World Peace, who has been suspended by the league 11 times since 2003, laid out why he shouldn’t be blamed for his latest transgression. And perhaps many of them too. ‘I came to the NBA in ’99. I started watching NBA basketball, like, in ’95. The Knicks, Miami, I was a fan of those type of playoff series that took place in the NBA on TV and I wanted to play in that atmosphere,” World Peace said. “So as a young kid I had to make a decision: I’m not going to be scared to play in that type of game. That’s my mind frame. You look at [Michael] Jordan against Detroit, Jordan had to grow. They were bullying him. so I’m like, ‘OK, that’s never going to happen to me. When I get to the league, I dare somebody from, like, the Detroit Pistons to try to bully me.’ I was in the league when I was a rookie, I remember Alonzo Mourning saying, ‘You come in here again, young fella, blahblahblah.’ I went in there again. Nineteen years old. Do it.’ “
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Dan Malone is a third-year journalism student at the University of King’s College in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He blogs, edits and learns things on the fly for Sheridan Hoops. Follow him on Twitter.