I hope Oscar Robertson was watching Saturday night. I hope he saw Stephen Curry answer his ridiculous, attention-starved musings as definitively as possible. I hope he wasn’t too jaded to see Curry handle the ball in a way Robertson only wished he could. I hope his eyesight still works well enough to see from where Curry was launching – and making – his shots. And I hope Robertson and a number of NBA stars from bygone eras will just shut up and
Over the last two weeks, Doc Rivers the coach has done a fantastic job of covering for Doc Rivers the GM. The Los Angeles Clippers have won nine straight games, the last eight without superstar forward Blake Griffin, who – in case you hadn’t noticed over the past couple of seasons – has overtaken Chris Paul as the team’s best player. When Griffin got hurt, the Clippers appeared to be in trouble. They had just lost three straight games to San Antonio,
OAKLAND – During Golden State’s otherworldly 24-0 start, interim coach Luke Walton was asked how it felt to get no official credit for the victories. NBA policy is that only the permanent coach can accumulate wins and losses, so those victories went to Steve Kerr, who has yet to coach this season while recovering from back surgery. The winning streak, which set an all-time pro sports record for consecutive victories to open a season, ended Saturday with a 108-95 loss to
As the Los Angeles Lakers slowly and painfully transition away from the Kobe Bryant era, the franchise actually did the right thing in bottoming out last season. The Lakers went a franchise-worst 21-61 last season under first-year coach Byron Scott, losing 29 games by double digits. Forward Julius Randle was lost for the season with a foot injury in the opener, and everything went pretty much downhill from there. Los Angeles had the second-worst defensive rating and scoring defense while finishing 24th
Two points in time define the last several months for the Los Angeles Clippers. The first came in May, when the Clippers blew a 3-1 series lead in the Western Conference semifinals before falling to Houston. With DeAndre Jordan becoming an unrestricted free agent and Chris Paul pushing 30, there were worries that the proverbial window of opportunity for this team was beginning to close. That nearly proved to be the case over the July 4th weekend, when Jordan verbally agreed to
Every four decades, the basketball galaxy is in alignment for the Golden State Warriors. And on cue, last season was one of those moments as the Warriors won their first NBA championship since the days of Rick Barry 40 years ago. Last season’s Warriors were a talented group, particularly deep and immune to significant health problems, which they managed to avoid. In a breakthrough season, Stephen Curry achieved NBA Most Valuable Player status. Even their postseason matchups seemed to be hand-picked. And they did all of this with a rookie coach, no less. Now comes
The Phoenix Suns are a fascinating bunch to watch, in the way fans watch a demolition derby for the promise of imminent destruction. Coach Jeff Hornacek, entering the final guaranteed year of his contract, has to right the ship without the benefit of a rising star to buoy hopes for the future. That Hornacek was able to cobble together an 87-77 record the last two years without a single All-Star is a testament to his coaching ability. But he lost
Under the guidance of Sacramento Kings legend and current VP of basketball operations and GM Vlade Divac, the Kings have assembled the most talented roster they have had in nearly a decade. So why are so many expecting the worst out of Sacramento this season? It’s complicated. The long-term consequences for how Divac went about creating enough cap space to acquire the likes of Rajon Rondo, Kosta Koufos, Marco Belinelli, Caron Butler, Seth Curry, James Anderson, Quincy Acy and Duje Dukan