Ryan McNeill of Hoops Addict: “With NBA defenders unable to stop him the elevator at Bosh’s condo attempted to give it a try. Yes, you read that right: Bosh was trapped in the elevator of his own condo for nearly 50 minutes tonight while on his way to the Air Canada Centre. Despite Bosh being thrown off his pregame routine and not arriving at the arena until less than a hour before the opening tip, he still managed to flirt with a triple-double and finished with 30 points, 10 rebounds, seven assists and three blocks.”
Dave Feschuk of the Toronto Star: “Barkley, in panning James’ shameless fuelling of speculation around his future, has rarely made more sense. And last night James, speaking to reporters in Cleveland, fired off the only kind of comeback you’d expect from the man-child they sometimes call LeBrat: ‘He’s stupid. That’s all I’ve got to say about (Barkley).’ Bosh, in juxtaposition, has never appeared so sage, especially as a conductor of business who’s clearly not dim enough to bite the hand of a Toronto franchise that will pay him, as the 13-3 Cavs will pay James, some $14.4 million this season. And James – in arriving in New York earlier this week wearing the so-called Big Apple edition of his sneaker saying things like, ‘July 1, 2010 is going to be a very, very big day’ – was dim. Said Bosh of his friend James: ‘Different things are fun for different people. … I don’t too much like to deal with the attention and the chaos that (kind of talk) brings. I just focus on what I’m doing now and don’t worry about (2010).’”
Ken Berger of CBSSports.com: “Billy Hunter, executive director of the NBA Players Association, warned last night that any potential free agent who waits around for a new CBA will do so at his own peril. Owners almost certainly won’t extend the CBA through the 2011-12 season, so it is set to expire on June 30, 2011. ‘We’re going to make every effort to get a deal,’ Hunter said. ‘But I have to plan as if there will be an eventual lockout.’ Another factor: By the time the owners and players start negotiating around the All-Star break, the league may be looking at some very grim revenue projections because of the economic downturn. About half the money that goes to player salaries is safe because it comes from the TV networks. The other half — tickets, concessions, etc. — is going down. Not even Tiger Woods’ endorsement deal with General Motors was safe, and that development was not lost on James.”
WaitingForNextYear: LeBron Recieves Criticism for Role in 2010 Hype
Bill Livingston of The Plain Dealer: “The players, James included, know the team was a much better one than the 2007 NBA finalists. All of coach Mike Brown’s emphasis on defense seems finally to have worked this season. Unlike former Cavs coaches Paul Silas and John Lucas, unlike for that matter, the Browns’ Romeo Crennel, Brown did what he promised to do. He has turned the Cavs into a top-flight defensive team. James wants to keep his options open. And even if he leaves, the fair-minded will have good memories of him. The biggest bad memory will be this silly, self-aggrandizing game of ‘Where’s Waldo?’ that is projected to the future and called ‘Where’s LeBron Next?’ TNT cable television’s Charles Barkley correctly criticized James for this. It is immature. It is a distraction. James’ teammates, the front office, and his fans deserve better.”
20 Second Timeout: “When the Nuggets first acquired Iverson, the spin was that having another player on the court who demands a double team would free up Anthony’s game and Denver would become an unstoppable offensive juggernaut. Now the new story is that Iverson held back Anthony’s game–though Anthony’s offensive statistics while playing alongside Iverson suggest otherwise–but that Billups will help to create open shots for Anthony. It is funny how the same people who claim that Hamilton’s catch and shoot game will not mesh well with Iverson’s style completely ignore the fact that Anthony is a one on one player who creates his own shot, not a dependent player who spots up and waits to receive a pass. Frankly, it is more likely that Hamilton will ultimately benefit from Iverson’s ability to break down defenses with speed and dribble penetration than that Anthony will shoot and/or score any better with Billups than he did with Iverson.”
Chris Tomasson of the Rocky Mountain News: “In 2005-06, Karl’s first full Denver season, the 6-foot-8, 230-pound Anthony averaged 4.9 rebounds, a rather embarrassing figure for someone of his size and strength. But with Karl constantly on him, Anthony increased his rebounding to 6.0 in 2006-07 and 7.4 last season. ‘Melo had his moments last year,’ Karl said. ‘I think this spurt started somewhere last year. His focus, his discipline for staying in his rebounding slot and rebounding the ball (have improved).’ During his past eight games, Anthony has averaged 9.9 boards, including two games in which he grabbed 13. ‘I’d say double digits,’ Anthony said of how many rebounds he wants to average this season.”
Ira Winderman of SunSentinel.com: “Of harsh comments attributed to him toward Heat President Pat Riley, the Heat medical staff and even supporting players on last season’s team, O’Neal claimed they were fabrications. ‘I’m not that type of person,’ he said with a smile. If anything, O’Neal, who had pulled himself from the Heat lineup weeks before he was dealt, said Riley pushed him out the door, in a bid to rebuild around guard Dwyane Wade.”
Scott Howard-Cooper of the Sacramento Bee: “The Kings have precious few players that will get in the face of a teammate with the kind of accountability good teams need in the locker room. That was apparent again Wednesday and it’s relevant again tonight, because help may be on the way with the possible return of Francisco Garcia. Garcia is policeman No. 1. He will call out a teammate behind the scenes, one of the few that will metaphorically grab someone by the collar and make a point. But he has been out all season with a strained calf, and it’s hard to have the same juice when you never play. The first quote Sam Amick had from Theus in the story in the paper today that focused on Garcia’s potential 2008-09 debut: ‘His competitiveness is something we need desperately. It’s his attitude. He’s one of the leaders on this team, a verbal, emotional leader.’”
X’s & O’s of Basketball: Atlanta Hawks Baseline 3-pointer Secondary Break
Terry Pluto of The Plain Dealer: “The key to this season is how quickly Delonte West and Mo Williams have meshed together. West feels like he’s back at St. Joseph’s, where Jameer Nelson was the point guard and West the shooting guard. They may have been the best backcourt in college basketball for a few seasons. Don Nelson believes it’s Williams who has really jump-started the Cavs. ‘I always liked him when he played in Milwaukee,’ the Golden State coach said in his pregame press conference. ‘We thought he was a terrific combo guard, he can play with anyone.’ Brown said he knew Williams could create his own shot off the dribble, and swish open jumpers. But the coach is even more impressed with Williams’ point-guard skills and leadership.”
Rick Bonnell of The Charlotte Observer: “Not that it’s a great distinction to be the most valuable player on a team losing two out of every three games. Still … Based on November, the Bobcats’ early-season MVP is an easy call: Raymond Felton. Obviously, scoring 31 points in an overtime road victory would catch anyone’s attention. But I would have seen it this way if Felton hadn’t played a minute against the Indiana Pacers Friday. It’s more about Felton’s approach than anything else. He’s finding different ways to impact a game – scoring, passing, rebounding – each night. And he’s demonstrating character and leadership in a situation that would bring out the worst in others.”
Tim Kawakami of the San Jose Mercury News: “SJax is clearly the Warriors’ best player and he will be even if Monta Ellis comes back at close to 100%. However… SJax’s peripheral statistics this season are horrendous so far, not at all indicative of somebody who is actually the team’s best player. In fact, the peripherals say that SJax might be one of the team’s worst performers. Sure, he leads the team in scoring (21.4 per) and assists (6.4, which would be almost two more per game than his previous career high). But he also leads the world in turnovers (3.88 per) and is shooting only 40.1% from the field. It gets worse. SJax is a -58 in the plus/minus stat, which is bad, since the Warriors as a team are -63 overall and SJax has played 88% of the team’s minutes. Last season, SJax was a +216.”
Matt Steinmetz of The Examiner: “In the days and weeks leading up to his contract extension, Jackson said all the right things about wanting to be in Golden State for the long haul and wanting to be a part of turning this thing around. Great start. But now that the ink on the extension is dry, and the Warriors are losing with what appears to be a bunch of mismatched pieces, this is the time for Jackson to ‘EARN’ the leadership mantle. And he didn’t do it after the loss to Cleveland. After a game in which the Warriors had more turnovers (14) than assists (13), with Jackson getting three of each, he had this to say: ‘Coach (Don Nelson) came in and said the youngsters are looking at us and not doing it, so I guess it’s us. I thought I was leading the team in assists, wasn’t I? So I know it ain’t me.’ Rule No. 1 of Leadership 101 is to always include yourself in any criticism of teammates or the team.”
At The Hive: “We miss Jannero Pargo. Never thought I’d say it. Never, ever in a million years. This is a guy that finished dead last in true shooting percentage, out of every single player in the NBA. Last. Think about that for a second. It’s quite a feat in and of itself. By PER, he was in the bottom 10% of all players who got as many minutes as him. And he was asking for as many guaranteed years as James Posey. So why exactly do we miss a guy whose career FG% is under 40%, who attempted an outrageous 84% of his shots on jumpers, and who pretty much chucked up shots at will? His passing.”
Frank Isola of the Daily News: “In the years before the franchise was hijacked by the point guard from Coney Island, the Knicks had an unwritten policy that if you wanted to listen to music before a game you had to do so wearing headphones. Patrick Ewing, Charles Oakley, Larry Johnson and Latrell Sprewell, all winners in New York, obeyed the rule. But when Marbury walked into the visitors’ locker room in Cleveland before his first game with the Knicks, he turned up the volume of his sound system and immediately turned off his co-workers. In a matter of minutes, Marbury had set a world record for alienating teammates. In the grand scheme of things, it was a minor infraction, especially when compared to Marbury’s subsequent misdeeds as a Knick. But it was an example of how naïve and selfish he was and remains.”
Ivan Carter of the Washington Post: “It took just two games for Ed Tapscott to be confronted by his first conundrum as Washington Wizards coach: How to get more scoring out of the back court? The easy answer would be to get three-time all-star Gilbert Arenas healthy enough to play, but that won’t happen until next month at the earliest. In the meantime, Tapscott has to squeeze more out of what he has. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, the Wizards’ starting back court (four players have started) is averaging 12 points per game this season. No other team’s back court averages fewer than 20.”
Dave D’Alessandro of The Star-Ledger: “The Nets are 5-2 since their 20-year-old rookie became a starter, and in those seven games he’s averaged 15.0 points on 50 percent shooting, 9.2 rebounds and 1.8 blocks. But he’s more than that, really. In less than a month, he has already established himself as the Nets’ third-best player — the kind of offensive fulcrum that they can play through for quarters at a time. And he is showing more dimensions every night — not only more shooting range or a nasty streak around the rim — but shades of gray that weren’t in his game a month ago, when he wasn’t sure of his role. As Atlanta Hawks’ coach Mike Woodson put it after watching Lopez’s first start, this kid is a load.”
Mitch Lawrence of the Daily News: “A month into his second NBA season, but the first in which he’s gotten out on the court, there’s been success and struggles for Portland’s Greg Oden. No matter how it’s gone so far, along with the Lakers’ 7-foot center Andrew Bynum, this could be the start of something big for the NBA. ‘I look at Oden in Portland and Bynum with the Lakers and we could have the next Russell and Chamberlain,’ said Knicks president Donnie Walsh. He really didn’t mean Bill Russell and Wilt Chamberlain, did he? ‘I know that’s saying a lot, but that’s who these two kids could be,’ Walsh added. ‘I think they’re going to change the league. Both are going to be high quality players. If you have hopes of winning a championship, you’re going to have to have one.’”
Kevin Ding of the Orange County Register: “Bynum has a cracked bone spur atop his right foot, and it’ll hurt for perhaps two weeks. The kid nicknamed ‘Big Baby’ by special assistant Kareem Abdul-Jabbar could’ve rested it to let it calm down, but with backup center Chris Mihm out with a sprained ankle, Bynum played. And he was money. For your average NBA veteran, it’s not that huge a deal to fight through this sort of thing. Bynum, though, is a young man who just hasn’t had a lot of experience being a true professional. And so it was tremendously encouraging for the Lakers to see Bynum go from wincing and favoring his foot in his pregame workout, unaccustomed to pain limitations when jumping or pushing off, to being so focused at game time that he did a series of little things right to get the Lakers a 20-10 lead before Lamar Odom replaced him. (Without Bynum, the Lakers immediately yielded a 9-0 run to Dallas.)”
Paul Coro of The Arizona Republic: “Asked if this system can provide him the chances he wants, he said, ‘I really don’t know. I know I put in a lot of hard work this off-season to really take that next step, to really be in the class of the D-Wades (Dwyane Wade) and the LeBrons (LeBron James) and the Dwights (Dwight Howard). I put in the hard work this off-season to be in that class. Right now, I’m a little frustrated.’ After making 9 of 21 shots in a Nov. 20 loss to the Lakers, Stoudemire mentioned those names to espn.com as ‘featured guys’ to say how he wants to be the go-to guy in an offense that now starts with Shaquille O’Neal post-ups. ‘I want to show the league and the world that I feel like my game has improved to that level,’ Stoudemire told espn.com. He said the Lakers ‘were fluid, flowing . . . I remember when we looked like that.’”
Dwight Howard: “I wasn’t really trying to be called Superman. My teammates had been calling me Superman for awhile, but, you know, I never even thought about trying to be called Superman. It just kind of fit me. Then when I put the cape on, it was just like a coincidence. Right when Soulja Boy came out, that song Crank That Soulja Boy was like my favorite song, I was always singing it and everybody had that as my ringtone every time I called them it would play the Superman song. And everybody just started saying Superman and then I used to always have Soulja Boy on, when we’d go somewhere with my homeboys, to the movies or bowling or whatever, we’d have that song on. I guess that’s how it all started. And after that, the Dunk Contest came and everybody started calling me Superman. It wasn’t like I came out and said “I’m Superman” or anything like that. It was just out of my hands. I’ve had like a billion nicknames my whole life and not one nickname I’ve picked. They called me Deebo (like from Friday). They called me Macho Man. The Punisher. A whole bunch of crazy nicknames I don’t know how they come up with them. They called me Little Head, because my shoulders were bigger than my head. They called me Beetlejuice, because they said they’d sprinkle Beetlejuice on me to make my head grow.”
David Hartnett of The Examiner: “Now, as it seems Battier, Artest and T-Mac will all be in the lineup against the San Antonio Spurs Saturday night, the question once again arises: How does Artest fit in? Since the trade was announced, it seemed that the best role Artest could fit would be the one Manu Ginobili fills for the Spurs. Ginobili is their sixth man, but plays just as many minutes as most of the starters. Where Battier is much more efficient when set up in the corner to fire three-pointers, Artest has a much more diversified skill set on the offensive end, and can handle being the “go-to-guy.” Therefore, it makes sense for Artest to be on the court with the group comprised of Aaron Brooks, Carl Landry and Brent Barry. Thus, in theory, it would make sense for Battier to remain in the starting lineup, where Yao’s double-teams can set up easy shots for Battier.”
Fran Blinebury of the Houston Chronicle: “What is wrong is McGrady stringing the team along and planning to let them know from day to day, night to night, whether he’s up to pulling on his uniform and Adidas. When McGrady scratched himself from the lineup on Wednesday against the Pacers, he specifically said it was not because he was in and danger of doing further damage to the knee. He said he felt ‘a little sore.’ He said he just was not playing at the level he wanted. When he pulled himself out on Wednesday, McGrady said he would get back to everyone on Saturday and let the world know if he was going to play against the Spurs, then again on Sunday in Denver. And again and again after that, we can only presume, until the end of the season. It certainly adds a touch of high drama to every game day afternoon, waiting for puff of white smoke to come from the rooftop of the Toyota Center, announcing McGrady’s status. That should not happen.”
