What a rotten week for the Spurs — three straight losses, the last two in triple overtime. Damian Lillard (career-high 43 PTS, 6 AST) and LaMarcus Aldridge (32 PTS, 16 REB) were fantastic to own on Friday as each played over 50 minutes. [Read more…]
Of the eight teams that reached the Western Conference playoffs last season, six of them had at least one player among the NBA’s top-20 in win shares. The two playoff teams that did not have a player among the top 20 were Memphis, with stars Marc Gasol, Mike Conley and Zach Randolph, and San Antonio, who boasts the famed star quartet of Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili and Kawhi Leonard. Obtaining, maintaining and sustaining a roster with All-Star level talent
The first full week of traditional fantasy leagues is in the books, and some of us are off to a great start. If you’re a Roto expert, put that knowledge to profitable use in daily fantasy basketball leagues at DraftKings. [Read more…]
After months of waiting and a summer full of roster change and player movement, the dawn of the 2014-15 NBA regular season is now upon us. Play begins with three games Tuesday night. The New Orleans Pelicans host the Orlando Magic at 8 p.m. (EST). The game will air the local Fox Sports affiliates — FSNOLA and FS Florida, otherwise, you can find it on NBA League Pass. Meanwhile, the NBA on TNT crew will host a doubleheader, starting with the
The Denver Nuggets head into the 2014-15 season with ambitious goals. The Nuggets are built around a young core that won a franchise-record 57 games only two seasons ago, only to be derailed by injuries and eliminated in the first round of the playoffs. That early exit precipitated the departure of their GM and coach. Last season, the injuries kept coming and the Nuggets missed the playoffs for the first time since 2003, the year they drafted Carmelo Anthony. The core is
As our own Max Ogden reported in Monday night’s SH Blog, the Denver Nuggets and forward Kenneth Faried recently agreed on a five-year, $60 million extension that guarantees him no less than $52M. Thursday, in lieu of said extension and in response to #TBT (Throwback Thursday), he reminisced on his first contract in the NBA by sharing a 2011 draft photo on Twitter. [Read more…]
When Danilo Gallinari tore his left ACL at the end of the 2012-13 season, the Denver Nuggets’ hopes of a deep playoff run were essentially ended. Gallinari suffered the injury during a late season matchup with Dallas, and without its leading sharpshooter, Denver was upset in the first round by Golden State. After being diagnosed as an ACL tear, it was yet to be seen whether Gallo would be ready for any of the 2013-14 season after he underwent surgery. In
Houston Rockets guard James Harden has a notorious reputation for being a lousy individual defensive player. Though there aren’t any statistics that perfectly measure a player’s actual impact on the defensive end of the court, there are a few that help paint the picture a bit more clearly. One such stat, which weighed heavily in San Jose Mercury News sports writer Tim Kawakami listing Harden on his 2014 NBA No-Defense Team, is Defensive Real Plus-Minus (DRPM). DRPM, as defined by ESPN, measures a player’s