July 1 is almost here. Wait, it isn’t? You mean there is still two feet of ice, slush and snow piled up outside the home office in New York? Well, if you compare July to October, then July is almost here! And there is no bigger date on the NBA calendar than July 1 (although the May 19 draft lottery is a close second). Phil Jackson becomes relevant again for something other than his Twitter vitriol. Jeanie Buss becomes more interesting
All-Star Weekend didn’t start out too well for my son, Andrew. On Friday morning, he had an argument with his first serious girlfriend a day before his first serious Valentine’s Day. With that hanging over his head, he had to go to work, where his primary job is to kick mallrats out of the store. And it was the last work day before the All-Star Game and we still hadn’t heard from someone who had said that maybe, just maybe, he
The All-Star reserve selections were finally announced on Thursday and as expected, there were predictable picks to go with inevitable omissions. The selected are as follows: West: Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, Chris Paul, Klay Thompson, LaMarcus Aldridge, Tim Duncan and James Harden. East: Jimmy Butler, Al Horford, Paul Millsap, Jeff Teague, Kyrie Irving, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh. [Read more…]
NEW YORK – The Knicks should put the “tank” in tanking to give the organization its best chance to land one of the most heralded center prospects in recent memory – Duke’s Jahlil Okafor. The Knicks put on a full court press with Carmelo Anthony, team president Phil Jackson, general manager Steve Mills and Allan Houston all on hand at Madison Square Garden to watch Okafor in action. “I like him,” Anthony said. “I think he’s got a great feel for the
One of the biggest knocks against the NBA is that when the season starts, there are only five or six teams that can truly win the championship, making the regular season and the early playoff rounds interminably tedious. Not this season. As we reach the midway point – 18 teams have played at least 41 games, another nine have played 40 – there are no less than a dozen teams with legitimate title aspirations, including a handful that haven’t been in the
The San Antonio Spurs won their fifth title last year when they routed the Miami Heat in five games. It was the fifth time that Gregg Popovich and Tim Duncan visited the President at the White House. The first time they did, Bill Clinton was in office. So overall, Duncan and Pop have met and have photographs with the last three Presidents of the United States. That’s pretty awesome if you ask me. [Read more…]
After a busy Monday night, there are only two games in the Association this evening. In daily fantasy, the extreme of ‘too many’ PG (congrats if you backed Damian Lillard) swings all the way to ‘not enough’. Most teams will have at least one guy named Brandon. [Read more…]
As good as the Spurs have been during the last 16 years, there is an inevitable point each season when gloomy forecasts surface. We had one here recently. At times, doubts are legitimate. The Spurs have won five titles, but 11 other times, they had problems that kept them from winning, although some of those can be traced to the excellence of opponents. When a team like the Lakers had Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant in their primes, losing to them was