Jeff Van Gundy is my NBA idol. I like to joke that Jeff is to me what Justin Bieber is to a teenaged girl. If Jeff was a cult leader, I’d not only join, I’d drink Jeff’s Kool-Aid in the jungle. The only topic I’ve ever vehemently disagreed on with Jeff is flopping. Jeff has been condemning flopping on national NBA broadcasts, on the biggest of stages, for years now. The league has gotten embarrassed enough to finally do something and boy, is
The NBA plans to stop the flop, or at least curtail it. The league announced Wednesday it will institute an anti-flopping rule this season with progressive fines growing as high as $30,000 before a possible suspension kicks in. Before you say “Hallelujah!” keep in mind that a player would have to be found guilty of flopping six times to get to that point. Here is the progression: First violation: Warning Second violation: $5,000 fine Third violation: $10,000 fine Fourth violation: $15,000 fine Fifth violation: $30,000 fine Sixth violation: larger
Remember when Blake Griffin suffered a meniscus tear in his left knee over the summer? We really haven’t heard too much about it since, but he is apparently just fine now and and would be ready to play if training camp opened today. He didn’t get to work with Hakeem Olajuwon as originally planned, but appears to have been working on his jump shot and free throws – some of his biggest struggles from last season. See the current mindset
Through his very last timeout huddle with his team, Oklahoma City Thunder coach Scott Brooks said all the right things. “We’re gonna treat them like they’re the champions,” Brooks instructed his club. “After this game, we’re gonna walk and shake their hands and acknowledge all of them. They beat us fair and square. However hard that hurts, they beat us fair and square. Give them credit.” Yes, Brooks said all the right things. It would have been nice if he had done all
SOUTH BEACH — “Harden at the end of game three – a bad foul,” said Jeff Van Gundy, former Knicks head coach and current ABC analyst. “Two bad fouls in the third quarter of Game 3. The game is turning based on these small things that turn out to be huge in their amount of consequence going into winning and losing. “These last three games have been so close.” You can say that again, Jeff. To give you an idea of just how
MIAMI — He had hit just two of his previous 18 attempts from the field, but none of that seemed to bother Mario Chalmers during Game 4 of the NBA Finals last night in the biggest performance of his career to this point. “Mario has that thing,” said Dwyane Wade, who has played alongside Chalmers for four seasons– before the Big Three was formed. “That thing called heart, and no matter what, no matter how tough we are on him, he actually
