Remember when a potential homecoming for Kevin Durant with the Washington Wizards was the buzz around the league? It wasn’t all that long ago, and it seemed more than plausible, for rational reasons. Free agents sometimes want a new start; players sometimes want to return closer to their hometowns; teams that are one superstar away from being legit contenders can sometimes get that superstar of their dreams. That was the plan that drove the Wizards’ thinking for the past 12 months … if not
With just 10 days left in the NBA regular season, there’s still a lot to be determined and decided. Records can be broken, playoff fates will be sealed and the season will be mercifully be over for several hopeless teams around the league. With the regular season reaching its last days, we give you the 10 most important questions that needs to be answered before the postseason begins. It’s going to be YUGE. [Read more…]
The Thunder made an offseason coaching change from Scott Brooks to Billy Donovan. The move was inherently tied to Donovan’s ability as an offensive coach to improve the team’s efficiency and versatility. [Read more…]
One couldn’t have imagined a worse outcome for the Oklahoma City Thunder in the 2014-15 season. A massive plague of injuries kept the team below full strength for the entire campaign. Specifically, Kevin Durant missed 55 games, Serge Ibaka missed 18 games and Russell Westbrook missed 15 games. The other four rotation players who started and finished the season with OKC – Anthony Morrow, Steven Adams, Andre Roberson and Nick Collison – missed between eight and 16 games each. All those missed
What would it take for Kobe Bryant to win the 2015-2016 NBA MVP award? As we handicap the MVP race for the 2015-2016 season, we’ll take a look at last season’s top five finishers— Stephen Curry, James Harden, Russell Westbrook, Anthony Davis and LeBron James— along with Kevin Durant. But a question many Angelenos and basketball fans around the world have is what kind of numbers would Bryant have to put up in his age-37 season to take home the crown? To
The playoffs have been defined by lopsided first-round series and calls to abolish the Hack-a-Shaq strategy from NBA fans across Twitter to this point. Meanwhile, the Oklahoma City Thunder – who failed to qualify for the playoffs for the first time since 2009 – made news recently by firing head coach Scott Brooks. The move was made with a long-term view to hopefully retain franchise cornerstones Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook. Both players were taken selected in the draft, which is only
If Sam Presti does not hire a coach that Kevin Durant is happy with, chances are Durant will leave Oklahoma City as an unrestricted free agent in July, 2016. That is a fact. Kevin Durant likes Kevin Ollie. That is a fact, too. And Kevin Ollie is Presti’s No. 1 choice for the job. That fact was first reported by respected colleague Adam Zagoria, and it is 100 percent on the money. So what to make of Ollie’s statement today, tactfully written in
Teams in the NBA playoff races aren’t the only ones watching scoreboards this time of year. Take the Philadelphia 76ers, for example. The Sixers lost their first 17 games, were mathematically eliminated from the playoff race nearly a month ago and almost certainly will lose 60-plus games for the second straight season. But GM Sam Hinkie and the rest of the Sixers’ front office are tracking the results of other games almost as closely as their own. That’s because Philadelphia could have