After having missed the playoffs for the past four-straight seasons—ever since four-time NBA MVP LeBron James left home for the warm beaches of Miami to join Chris Bosh, Dwyane Wade and the Heat, and after surprisingly good luck in the past two NBA draft lotteries gifted the Cleveland Cavaliers with back-to-back top-overall picks, there may have been little hope for any monumental improvement entering the summer of 2014. That was, of course, before James made the decision to go home, rejoining
In my latest SheridanHoops previews for the upcoming season I have the Brooklyn Nets and New York Knicks as playoff teams. What about the rest of the league? Can Kobe Bryant carry the Lakers to the playoffs with Steve Nash now out for the season? Is this the year the Chicago Bulls fulfill their potential and reach the NBA Finals? Are the Cleveland Cavaliers the title favorites with LeBron James and Kevin Love joining forces with Kyrie Irving? With that in mind, I joined FOX
There has been plenty of concern since the summer on whether Derrick Rose would be able to regain half the form that made him the MVP of the league a few seasons ago. The point guard was selected to play for Team USA in the FIBA World Cup, but was noticeably ineffective despite playing against mostly inferior competition. After his breakout performance against the Cleveland Cavaliers on Monday, the concerns are beginning to subside. Despite losing 107-98, Rose looked dominant on the
If you were to create the most perfect basketball player, who would it be and what skills would that player have? That probably depends on whether you ask a small or a big man. If you asked a big man, they’d probably say something like Yao Ming’s height with Shaquille O’Neal’s strength, along with Wilt Chamberlain’s offense and Bill Russell’s defense. If he can also shoot like Dirk Nowitzki? Forget about it. Ask a more guard-oriented person and they might tell you a
On Thursday, we gave you our All-Breakout Team for the upcoming season for the Eastern Conference. Today, we bring you our Western Conference All-Breakout Team. These are the players we believe are on the verge of breaking out or standing out. We used the same parameters – five players, one at each position, but no rookies. Let’s get right to it. [Read more…]
Could the unique contract structure arranged by the Dallas Mavericks and owner Mark Cuban to pry Chandler Parsons from the Houston Rockets become a template for freeing future restricted free agents? Multiple league GMs think it could, according to a new report from ESPN‘s Marc Stein. The Parsons contract, which is almost-max-level over three years and includes a player option after Year 2 and maximum 15% trade kicker, proved difficult for the Rockets to match on several levels, even though they fully intended
By this point, David Blatt’s journey – from the suburbs of Boston to Princeton to Israel, followed by a Magellanesque coaching journey around Europe, a Euroleague title with Maccabi Tel Aviv and finally landing a head coaching job in the NBA with LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers – is well documented. But what Blatt has learned along the way and what he brings to the professional game is more than worth chronicling. Maccabi Tel Aviv, Blatt’s former team, just completed its
CLEVELAND — Walking out of Quicken Loans Arena Sunday night, I had a chance to catch several fragments of conversation. “That place was nuts,” said one man. “I can’t wait for the season,” said a middle-aged woman. Most of the time, though, all I could catch was a name. “LeBron James.” “LeBron James.” “LeBron James.” It couldn’t have been more obvious who the fans came out to see. And, unlike most preseason games, this wasn’t just the diehards (or if it was, there are suddenly a lot