The referees for tonight’s Game 5 of the Eastern Conference finals are Danny Crawford, James Capers and Marc Davis. Their assignment is to call two fouls on Roy Hibbert within the first 90 seconds. Just kidding. But let there be no doubt the Miami Heat will do their best to attack the basket and draw fouls on Hibbert tonight as the series shifts back to Miami tied 2-2, because the Heat’s best plan of attack is to neutralize the one player who
Lionel Hollins, whose contract is about to expire, may very well have coached his final game for the Memphis Grizzlies. And he may have sealed his fate months ago, not mere hours ago when his Grizzlies were swept out of the playoffs, when he said you can’t have champagne tastes on a beer budget. [Read more…]
Indiana Pacers coach Frank Vogel is taking a ton of heat (pun intended) today for removing Roy Hibbert from the lineup for the final play of Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals last night when LeBron James made a driving layup at the buzzer in overtime for a 103-102 victory. And make no mistake, Vogel made a mistake — he even admitted as much in the postgame interview room. But what about Paul George, who would have been the hero of
That has been my pick all along, and I repeated it today in this video with Noah Coslov of CineSport. [Read more…]
Words to live by: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Surely Sam Presti and Clay Bennett of the Oklahoma City Thunder have heard that expression, as both are smart, successful businessmen with good educational backgrounds, although they are a generation apart in age. Presti is the wise child who built the Oklahoma City Thunder from scratch, taking over at age 30 on June 7, 2007, prior to the team’s final season in Seattle, renting a small apartment with his then-girlfriend near
Y’all remember “Flash” don’t you? That was Dwyane Wade’s nickname back when he entered the NBA, and it was appropriate for two reasons: Few players entered the league with as much flash and flair as Wade, and no player had a nickname that rhymed so perfectly with what could have been his second nickname — “Crash.” [Read more…]
Bruised and bloodied, the Chicago Bulls have no chance of overcoming a 3-1 deficit against LeBron James and the Miami Heat, right? Right? Well, don’t be so sure. Some pretty good players have been on the wrong end of 3-1 comebacks in the playoffs. Guys like Kobe Bryant. Patrick Ewing. Julius Erving. Charles Barkley. George Gervin. Jerry West. And Wilt Chamberlain. And Oklahoma City’s Kevin Durant and New York’s Carmelo Anthony don’t have enough help to overcome a 3-1 deficit and win their
Well, we have one series tied at 2-2, and if the basketball gods smile on us we are on our way to four Game 7s. We can’t all be that lucky, can we? But we can hope. (Note to self: Powerball reminder). But if we are going to get to four Game 7s, we are going to need to see some improvement from at least one player on each trailing team (plus the Warriors, who are tied 2-2 but are at