I hate to say I told you so, but after the first day of Team USA training camp in Las Vegas, I wrote that Kenny “The Manimal” Faried must be the first guy selected for the roster and everyone else should come thereafter. My reasoning was Faried’s motor, toughness and energy level with intangibles such as putbacks and garbage points would be invaluable to this team. In Sunday’s come-from-behind victory against Turkey, Faried led Team USA team with 22 points and
LAS VEGAS – Team USA’s training camp ended disastrously with the gruesome leg fracture suffered by Paul George. Team leaders Jerry Colangelo and Mike Krzyzewski postponed indefinitely any decisions on the makeup of the roster, which was the right thing to do. For the time being, our thoughts and prayers should be with Paul George and his family. With that being said, the U.S. national team will eventually move forward. And after having been with them for a week, up close and
LAS VEGAS – Day 1 of Team USA’s training camp was point guards. Day 2 is frontcourt bigs. Right now, it seems as though the consensus is condor-like Anthony Davis is the only sure thing to make the 12-man roster going to Spain for the World Cup. After that, everything else is up in the air. The other candidates are power forwards Kenneth Faried and Paul Millsap and centers Andre Drummond and DeMarcus Cousins. And the guy I want to talk about is
I have always pondered the challenge of being an NBA coach, so here’s my attempt at coming up with three different key strategies for both coaches and teams to implement if they are going to win the championship. I personally feel that San Antonio’s Gregg Popovich is not only the premier coach in the game today, I actually believe he is one of the greatest leaders of any sport in the history of our country. On the other side you have Miami’s
As far back as I can remember, it was always “You bring your guys and I’ll bring my guys, and Let’s Have At It. This year’s Sweet 16 reminds me very much of that old axiom. As close friends and family can attest, I have always been considered a basketball savant — from a very early age as they would say Bobby is of those coaches who can beat you with his guys, then turn around and beat you with your
From the time I first saw Chuck Daly, Pat Riley and my all-time favorite, Larry Brown, who used to wear the cool sport coats with the patches on the elbow, roaming the sidelines coaching in the NBA, I aspired to someday be an NBA head coach. Because I read about the great Moses Malone putting a note in the Bible, wanting to be a great NBA player someday, I decided at age 11 to do the same thing. Somehow, I didn’t
To shop for NCAA Tournament tickets, click on this banner. Before everybody picks Florida in their NCAA Tournament brackets, a word of caution: The Gators can be upset by a small college team. I would know – because my team did it to them a decade ago. Last Saturday, while driving up I-95 to the Basketball Hall of Fame for an induction ceremony for a former player of mine, Luis Flores, a flood of memories washed over me.