This keeps happening: I watch the Knicks lose, then I switch the channel and marvel at an ex-Knick leading his team. It happened again Monday night, when New York was losing to Dallas on Dirk Nowitzki’s lucky bounce at the buzzer, and one click of the remote control brought me to Clippers-Pelicans, where Jamal Crawford was burying another seven 3-pointers. Crawford was once a Knick. So was David Lee. And Zach Randolph. And Channing Frye. Any of those guys might make a nice
Does anyone want Danny Granger? How about Jimmer Fredette? This is the last week for contenders to shore up their playoff rosters with NBA players for a run they hope will last into June. Teams have until March 1 to sign players eligible for the playoffs. The Los Angeles Clippers already made a big splash on that front by signing Glen “Big Baby” Davis, who had the final two years of his contract bought out by Orlando. It’s a good fit. The Clippers desperately
We’ve been waiting all season for LeBron James to pull a Kevin Durant and go for 40 or more points, and the wait has ended. Did LeBron’s 42 against Dallas last night earn him some love in these rankings? Well, sort of. IMHO, James is the best player in the NBA. But “best” player does not equate to Most Valuable, as the operative word when determining that award is “valuable.” A year ago, Gary Washburn of the Boston Globe felt that Carmelo
This past week, NBA TV released excerpts of an extended interview with LeBron James (airing in its entirety Monday night) in which Steve Smith asked “The King” to name his Mount Rushmore of basketball. James offered a quartet of Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, Magic Johnson and Oscar Robertson. But it’s really an unfair question, because in addition to those four players, there are at least three more – centers Wilt Chamberlain, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Bill Russell – who are in the
Engrave today’s date in your head, as tonight’s slam dunk competition could be worth remembering. NBA All-Star 2014 marks only the second time that the Sprite Slam Dunk competition will feature three All-Star Game participants. In recent years, fans have become accustom to doing a web search on half of the players in the competition. In the year 2000, Vince Carter rocked the rims and probably had the best dunk contest of all-time. In 2003 we saw Jason Richardson score perfect fifties. A
It is time to ask the rhetorical question: Is the MVP race over? Has Kevin Durant wrapped this thing up already by guiding the Oklahoma City Thunder to the highest win total in the NBA (30 games over .500) despite the absence of Russell Westbrook? It was about this time a year ago that LeBron James started creating the separation that would ultimately make him the near-unanimous choice (Gary Washburn of the Boston Globe was the only voter who cast a ballot
It was announced on Thursday that Indiana Pacers star Paul George would enter this year’s Slam Dunk contest along with John Wall, Damian Lillard, Terrence Ross, Harrison Barnes and Ben McLemore. George, who entered the contest back in 2012 as a second-year player still learning the ropes of being an NBA player, showed in the contest that he can dunk with the best of them. He converted his first attempt with an impressive dunk over 7’2″ teammate Roy Hibbert. His second
Sometimes the best way to evaluate the Most Valuable Player is to watch him ride solo for a while. Yes, stats count. So does his performance in close games, his output against the better teams, his showdowns with fellow candidates and his overall leadership. However, a true indicator can be how the player performs when he has to go it alone. This season, we have all marveled at Kevin Durant. The perennial MVP candidate has been truly spectacular. But what has elevated