As the Dallas Mavericks compete for one of the most competitive No. 8 seeds in NBA history, they’ve relied heavily on Vince Carter to provide veteran leadership and production to the team’s second lineup. While he is the team’s sixth man by assignment, coach Rick Carlisle still considers him one of Dallas’ most important players. This is evident by Carter’s defined role in the final minutes of close games. Carter is averaging nearly seven fourth-quarter minutes per game in 2013-2014, nearly two
LAKERS TARGETING KEVIN LOVE ESPNLosAngeles.com’s Dave McMenamin: Timberwolves president Flip Saunders will do everything he can to keep Love, who is fourth in the league in scoring at 26.3 points per game and third in rebounding at 12.6 per game this season. And Minnesota will have the advantage of being able to offer a five-year extension, versus a four-year deal from any other team. But if Love makes it clear that he has no intention to re-up with the Wolves, Saunders will be
When the Pelicans gave Tyreke Evans a four-year, $44 million dollar offer sheet last summer, fans and analysts alike were skeptical of whether Evans had earned that deal. After several years of franchise turmoil in Sacramento, Evans’ morale was at an all time low. The former Rookie of the Year had regressed from a prolific star in the making to a streaky enigma on one of the league’s worst teams. Committing near-max money to Evans looked like a gross miscalculation by a New
As teams continue to jockey for position in the Western Conference — and fight for 50 wins just to get in — one of the early season darlings continues to sink. That would be the Portland Trailblazers. Once the talk of the NBA, the Blazers have hit a rough patch at the worst possible time, losing nine of their last 13 games and are now just a half game ahead of the Golden State Warriors for the 6th spot in the
Let’s play a quick game of “Name That Big Man”: Since the All Star Break (nine games), Player A, an All-Star, has averaged 19.0 points on 51.6% shooting in 33 minutes per game. Since the All Star Break (nine games), Player B, not an All-Star, has averaged 16.3 points on 51.3% shooting in 27 minutes per game. [Read more…]
The clip above is what the Orlando Magic decided to show in the second quarter of the game against the Houston Rockets when Dwight Howard came to town on Wednesday. It was a short tribute video for all the marvelous years Howard gave to the franchise. The question is, why in the world would the Magic do this? Were they really looking to honor and thank Howard for his time with the team? If that was truly what they had in mind, that’s
If you’re a regular reader of my weekend blogs, you might know that I grew up in Baltimore, and I’m more than a little proud of my city. We’ve got a storied history of people who became legends in their fields leaving town and becoming closely associated with bigger cities with brighter lights. Tupac Shakur and Babe Ruth both went to high school in Baltimore, just to name a couple. Another former Baltimore resident is Carmelo Anthony. He attended Towson Catholic
In case you haven’t noticed, Dwyane Wade has been missing an awful lot of games this season for someone who reportedly has no injuries. The Miami Heat’s training staff have Wade on a strict schedule in terms of when he should play – he has missed 12 games on the season – to preserve and prepare his body for the playoffs. The problem with this is that the team is just 7-5 when he is out of the lineup, and it’s