SH Blog: Westbrook already dunking in practice, Wallace puts the Celtics on blast

• The Los Angeles Lakers are looking for the right pace this season, from Dave McMenamin of ESPN Los Angeles: “It will be up,” D’Antoni said of the pace. “It won’t be crazy, but we want to push it. It will be a nice pace. We want to get some easy buckets before the defense sets up. So we’ll be up in the top five in pace, that’s normal, but it won’t be breakneck speed. It will be good enough where everybody can catch up. We were third last year so it will be more or less like last year.”… “I think we have to utilize their speed and their athleticism but not too much,” Pau Gasols aid. “Not too much faster than we did last year, because I think we still have to play somewhat of a controlled pace and a pace that everybody is comfortable with and go from there.”… “I think he learned that it wasn’t the personnel, maybe we didn’t have the makeup for that type of play,” Nash said. “We didn’t have maybe the shooting or athleticism last year.”

• Nick Young is upset that the Los Angeles Clippers are covering up the Lakers championship banners during home games, from McMenamin of ESPN: “He can do that?” Young said after Lakers practice Sunday, the team’s first since returning from China. “For real? That’s disrespectful. We got to talk to Doc. He can’t have that. We got to do something about that.”… “That’s a lot of pull y’all are giving Doc,” Young said, somewhat facetiously. “I think he shouldn’t come in and have so much pull like that. He’s got to earn his keep.”… When a reporter argued that Rivers’ championship resume from his time with the Boston Celtics should give the coach the credence to do so, Young retorted, “But he didn’t win no title in L.A. That’s where it’s at. Look at all these banners in here, you can’t shadow those up.”

• We thought we’d see Nerlens Noel at some point this season, but that may not be the case. Dei Lynam of CSN Philly has details: “Nearing the end of a routine pregame interview with Brown, a reporter asked about Noel’s progress. “Slow,” Brown said before the Sixers’ preseason game against Cleveland. “I doubt, I think everybody doubts he is going to play this year. But he is with us in every way in terms of practices and shoot-around, film session. It is a classroom opportunity for him to learn [about] me and the NBA. We don’t want to waste this year.”… “It most definitely was not the plan all along, and I think it is a work in progress,” Brown said. “It was a decision I thought was going to be made, but nobody ever said to me that this is a definite. I think everybody is expecting it to be a definite decision, but even now as we speak no one has said that this is 100 percent certainty.”

• According to ESPN, Jeremy Lin is no lock to be the starter for the Houston Rockets: “Some fans might not like the uncertainty, but Houston Rockets coach Kevin McHale says he has “two starting point guards” in Jeremy Lin and Patrick Beverley. Each player has started two games in the preseason, and the coach hasn’t said who will start the regular season and hasn’t ruled out that they’ll be on the floor at the same time. “As a player, I always found it irrelevant,” McHale said of starting, according to the Houston Chronicle. “I came off the bench in a lot of games. What is the big difference in playing 27½ minutes off the bench and playing 26 minutes as a starter? I guess it is a big deal to some people.” Lin appears to be on the same page as McHale. “We have different strengths,” Lin said, according to the newspaper. “[Beverley] is such a good defender and shooter. I am better with the ball in my hands, attacking. I think that makes us tough to scout, and it gives us the opportunity to give a lot of different looks.”

• There is nothing to worry about in terms of Andrew Bogut’s reported “back spasm”, from Rusty Simmons of SF Chronicle: “The injury status doesn’t seem as murky for Bogut, who was pulled less than three minutes into Friday’s game after experiencing spasms in his lower back. Jackson said after the game that he wasn’t concerned, and sure enough, the big man was back on the court Sunday. “It was very good news,” Jackson said. “I said it when I took him out, ‘He waved me off and wanted to stay in the game.’ But it was the smart thing to do, especially facing the long trip home. I’m glad he’s recovered and looks like himself.”… “If Andrew really wanted to tough it out and play, he would have, but there was no reason to risk that at this point of the season,” shooting guard Klay Thompson said. “I know Andrew, and I know that he’s fine. He’s a tough guy.

• It’s only preseason, but Didgeridoo Gerald Wallace is already taking shots at his new team, from Baxter Holmes of The Boston Globe: “We’re not playing with effort,” Wallace said as he sat in his locker, one of the last in the room before the Celtics boarded their charter flight back to Boston. “Guys are out there being selfish. The opponent is giving it their all, regardless of how the night is going. “[Sunday], we ran into another team that just wanted the game more than we did, and they came out and played like it. We had some good spurts, but when it came down to it, they were determined to win the game, and we weren’t.”… “When we step out on the basketball court, we get paid to do this. We’re professionals. So our main thing is, you should want to go out every night and win. It shouldn’t be a question of the effort. You’re going to miss shots, you’re going to turn the ball over, things aren’t going to go your way, but it shouldn’t be because you’re not playing hard or you’re not giving your all.”

• Michael Malone appears to be a fan of his rookie, from Jason Jones of The Sacramento Bee: “Coach Michael Malone on poise showed by rookie SG Ben McLemore in preseason loss at Portland. “For Ben, he’s a rookie but he’s been through so much in his life, I think playing in a gym like this is just fun for him. I don’t think anything is too big. That kid has had a tough upbringing so I love watching him out there – how confident he’s playing. That’s the biggest thing for a young guy, I just want Ben McLemore to be aggressive and play with great confidence and he’s doing that right now. He’s trying hard on the defensive end of the floor. He may make mistakes sometimes but it’s never because of lack of effort.”

• Zach Lowe of Grantland explains why the Utah Jazz paid Derrick Favors big money: “Favors won’t start earning that money this season, and that’s the key point here. In his fourth season, the last on his rookie contract, Favors will finally get a chance to start. The Jazz are betting that after such a season, Favors will have emerged as the sort of restricted free agent to whom some team would have offered a max deal — forcing the Jazz to match at that level. If it’s right, Utah will have saved itself some valuable cap space by acting early, just as Philadelphia (Jrue Holiday, now gone) and especially Golden State (Stephen Curry) did a year ago by acting in advance of restricted free agency. There are at least eight teams with the potential for max-level cap room next summer, and though a few are already crowded on the front line (Detroit, perhaps Orlando), there are at least a couple that would have loomed as potentially aggressive suitors for Favors.”
• Exceptional piece on why players are playing less, from Jared Zwerling of Bleacher Report. Be sure to click and read the entire article: “In fact, over most of the league’s history, the players with the highest mileage per game every season hovered around 39 to 42 minutes. Nowadays, not only are role players seeing less court time, but so are your favorite star players—some even five minutes fewer per game. (And that’s happening as the average price of an NBA ticket goes up. There was a 3.5 percent rise to $50.99 in 2012-13 from the previous season, according to Team Marketing Report.) The decrease in individual player minutes has been quite noticeable since the 1998-99 season. The average number of players seeing 40 minutes or more per game from 1998-99 to 2002-2003 was 9.4 per season. It decreased to 6.8 from 2003-04 to 2007-2008. Then, from 2008-09 to last season, that average number dipped all the way down to 0.6. So what’s going on?”

James Park is the chief blogger of Sheridan Hoops. Find him on twitter @SheridanBlog.