Many believed the Heat’s loss to the Spurs in the NBA Finals was when LeBron James first began to seriously consider leaving Miami. As it turns out, the wheels may have already been put in motion. Mike Miller, who followed James this offseason to the Cleveland Cavaliers, told the Cleveland Plain-Dealer this week that James initially began questioning the Heat’s brass when they used the amnesty provision on Miller in July 2013, sparing owner Micky Arison millions in salary and luxury-tax fees
The San Antonio Spurs may be the reigning NBA champions, but it’s the Dallas Mavericks and Houston Rockets who are stealing headlines out of Texas. From players swapping teams to front office members trading barbs, there’s been no shortage of drama in the state where everything’s bigger. On Monday, Rockets general manager Daryl Morey took the gloves off and returned shots at Mavericks owner Mark Cuban. In an interview with Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports, Morey responded to the consistent jabs that Cuban
HOUSTON — Is James Harden capable of being Kevin Durant 2.0 when it comes to post-FIBA growth? Many credited FIBA international play in 2010 with aiding Durant’s evolution into an NBA superstar. Now, fresh off a gold medal in Spain with the U.S. national team, Durant’s former teammate and good friend Harden is hoping to see a similar transformation of his own as he embarks on his third season as a franchise cornerstone, a Big Two alongside Dwight Howard for the Houston Rockets. The theme for
The summer of 2014 is remembered in Houston for what might have been. The most noteworthy names to highly consider forming a “Big 3” with James Harden and Dwight Howard were Carmelo Anthony and Chris Bosh, but former Rocket point guard Kyle Lowry is firmly on that star-studded list as well. In a wonderful feature by Grantland’s Jonathan Abrams on Lowry’s career-long search for trust, Abrams outlines Lowry’s falling out with Houston head coach Kevin McHale in the 2011-12 season and the subsequent
There were a lot of raised eyebrows when the Houston Rockets opted to let Chandler Parsons out of his contract a year early. Parsons was considered a bargain for the relatively cheap rookie contract that Houston had him under. [Read more…]
HOUSTON — After being unexpectedly jilted by Chris Bosh, the Rockets found themselves in a precarious spot this summer. They are now hoping that Jason Terry, who just turned 37, can be a small part of the solution. General manager Daryl Morey has said since January that Houston needs to acquire the “third-best player on a championship team” to align with established stars James Harden and Dwight Howard, implying he did not believe that player would be found internally on the current
With about six weeks remaining until the Oct. 31 contract extension deadline for 2011 draftees, Klay Thompson and the Warriors are in a bit of a standoff. He wants a maximum-salary contract or close to it, while the team would undoubtedly love to find a friendlier number for their cap future. maybe something like the $44 million, four-year deal they struck with backcourt mate Stephen Curry two years ago. On the surface, Thompson isn’t a max player yet. Though known first for
Houston Rockets guard James Harden has a notorious reputation for being a lousy individual defensive player. Though there aren’t any statistics that perfectly measure a player’s actual impact on the defensive end of the court, there are a few that help paint the picture a bit more clearly. One such stat, which weighed heavily in San Jose Mercury News sports writer Tim Kawakami listing Harden on his 2014 NBA No-Defense Team, is Defensive Real Plus-Minus (DRPM). DRPM, as defined by ESPN, measures a player’s