Throw a dart at their schedule, and at any particular moment the Denver Nuggets could look like the worst team in basketball or a monumental success. They opened 1-4, won 10 of their next 12, then not long after dropped eight straight. In the aggregate, Denver is more or less what people figured — a good-but-not-great team capable of making the playoffs, but certainly no lock to do so. The bigger question for the Nuggets going forward is whether they made the
Andre Miller is no longer suspended. But he won’t play tonight. The Denver Nuggets on Friday rescinded Miller’s two-game suspension. However, Miller still will miss all team activities – including two games – between now and Monday for what the team called personal reasons. So he’s not suspended. But he is still missing two games. OK. Rookie coach Brian Shaw somewhat explained the decision on the team’s Twitter account. [Read more…]
Can money buy happiness? If you’re the Brooklyn Nets and New York Knicks, the answer is no. The Nets have the league’s highest payroll, while the Knicks rank second. The combined exorbitant payroll has produced a deflating 18-38 record and proven any championship aspirations were merely a pipe dream. Ironically, speaking of the pipe, J.R. Smith was the first Knick to panic back when the team was only 3-8 at the time. Now, it appears Smith’s anxiety was warranted. Thanks to injuries, a lack
Jason Kidd and Brian Shaw were the two finalists for the Brooklyn Nets coaching position during the summer. While Kidd won out and was hired by the Nets, Shaw ended up getting his first head job in Denver with the Nuggets. So far, it sure seems like Shaw got the better end of that deal. While Brooklyn languishes near the bottom of the Eastern Conference, Denver won its seventh straight game Tuesday, efficiently eviscerating the Nets, 111-87, on a night where turmoil
Things couldn’t have gone much uglier for the New York Knicks in the first month of the season. They lost defensive anchor Tyson Chandler to a leg injury, J.R. Smith has been awful since coming back from a 5-game suspension, Amare Stoudemire has been a shell of himself while playing limited minutes, Iman Shumpert’s name in trade rumors has been a distraction, and Andrea Bargnani is what most of us expected him to be – a scoring forward who can’t rebound
It’s exactly 10 days into this NBA regular season, it feels like 10 weeks for those who cover the league on a regular basis, and a whole hell of a lot has already happened. Few things have gone as expected, of course the undefeated start for the Pacers is an exception, and surprises abound across the league. Here are 10 that immediately came to mind, including a pair of dazzling young point guards, one major market team in big trouble and
In a teleconference last week, we asked NBA analysts Chris Webber and Greg Anthony to pick a Western Conference team which missed the playoffs last season but will make the playoffs this season. “Dallas, mainly because of Dirk Nowitzki,” Webber said. “He’ll be back healthy. What he does, with spacing, getting guys involved … We take his game for granted.” “I would go with the Pelicans,” Anthony said. “I think that’s a team that could make sizeable leaps and surprise a lot
One night of preseason in the books, and nobody good hurt. I think that qualifies as a success. [Read more…]