The Fundamentals

Eddie Sefko of The Dallas Morning News:  “Dirk Nowitzki is one of the most down-to-earth superstars in NBA history. I’ve seen a bunch of them up close and personal. Nowitzki is one of the best. He’s in the same ballpark with Charles Barkley. And that’s about as big a compliment as I can pay a basketball player. He doesn’t worry about anything but what his team needs and what he can do to help. He’s also not afraid to say what he thinks, although Dirk has the good sense to filter it a little bit. Nowitzki said during the last road trip that he would be willing to sacrifice some money in the 2010 season if it helped the Mavericks get a big-time free agent. Admittedly, it’s easy to do this when you’ve already made more than $100 million in your NBA career. But Nowitzki has never been consumed by money. There have been a lot of stars who want to make sure they get every dollar they can. Nowitzki has earned all his money. And he realizes now that the one thing he doesn’t have, an NBA championship, he can’t buy.”

Jan Hubbard of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram:  “Mark Cuban was sitting near the Mavericks’ bench Friday night in New Jersey when Devin Harris was taken out of the game and fans expressed their appreciation for Cuban by chanting several times: Thank you, Cub-an. ‘That was really funny,’ Cuban said Sunday at the Mavericks game in Washington against the Wizards. ‘I thought it was hysterical.’ While it has become extremely popular in all parts of the NBA world to criticize Cuban and the Mavericks for trading Harris, Cuban remains steadfast in his belief that it was a good deal for Dallas. ‘There’s only one goal every year and that’s to win a championship,’ Cuban said. ‘And if you’re not going to win it right now, what puts your team in the best position flexibility-wise going forward? That was the question and [the trade] was the answer.’ The flexibility the Mavericks will have because of the trade has been overlooked.”

Paul Forrester of CNNSI.com:  “‘I tried to take different things from everybody,’ Bosh said of his experience in China. ‘You had LeBron accepting a leadership role, and he was fairly vocal with it. Kobe Bryant, perhaps the best scorer in the league, made the sacrifice [to focus on] defense and was an inspiration in how much he worked on his technique and his game. And Carmelo Anthony, there’s a reason he’s such a good shooter — he [practices] shooting countless numbers of times.’ That Bosh had the opportunity to learn so much speaks not only to his powers of observation but also to the time he had to watch his teammates in action. Though fourth in the league in minutes this season, he was relegated to second-team status in China, a role the sixth-year forward believes has made him a better player.”

David Gladow of NOLA.com:  “Players have been slow to grasp things before (particularly in Scott’s precise schemes), and there’s certainly no shame in Wright joining the long list of players who have had bumpy entries into the NBA. It could even be seen as a positive, as rampant speculation amongst fans had wondered about injury concerns, lack of effort, and the like. None of that is the case. Wright is just in the proverbial dog house for not executing. What actually IS troubling is Wright’s reaction to his current situation. ‘He (Scott) said I was making the same mistakes as last year,’ Wright said. ‘As a professional and all the things I’ve done this offseason, I refuse to believe that.’ This sounds like a man who doesn’t get it. Granted, all quotes can be taken out of context, and Wright may be as likely to take ownership over his current plight as anyone, but his words tell a different story. They say he doesn’t understand why he’s at where’s at, and more troubling, that he will not acknowledge the weaknesses in his game that brought him there.”

Dave Krieger of the Rocky Mountain News:  “Wins and losses being a zero-sum game, about half the teams in the NBA generally have losing records. Dominate those and you don’t have to play all that well against good teams to produce a fine winning percentage and early playoff reservation. This is exactly how the Nuggets have built their 18-10 record so far. They are a spectacular 12-1 against teams with losing records. In fact, the Billups-Allen Iverson trade was pending and they had neither player when they sustained the one loss - to Golden State in the fourth game of the season. For the Nuggets, of course, there is always a flip side. Despite handing the Celtics their only home loss of the season last month, they have generally struggled against good teams. That is a bigger concern than it might otherwise be because of the Nuggets’ chronic postseason frustrations. Having been eliminated in the first round for five consecutive years, they need to show they can stay on the floor against good teams to have any playoff credibility.”

Alan Hahn of Newsday:  “There’s just something about the stuff those Celtics exude, aside from the trash they talk. Sunday’s game didn’t have any of the bravado the previous matchup with the Knicks had, but what they lacked in smack they provided in smackdown. You can hate the Celtics as a rival, but you have to respect what they’re doing this season. At 26-2, they’ve tied the NBA mark for best start in league history. They matched the 1966-67 Philadelphia 76ers and the 69-70 Knicks. A win Tuesday against the Sixers and a new standard has been set. You look back at that Knicks team — Reed, Frazier, Bradley, DeBusschere — and see many similarities. Confidence, determination, accountability and, of course, complimentary skill. But the greatest difference is in motivation.”

Forum Blue & Gold:  “When things go wrong for the Lakers, and any team really, the first reaction of most fans is to pull up the ESPN trade machine and solve the problem as an armchair GM. Because, if the Lakers had a different point guard, who we could get by trading one of our three bigs who play significant minutes away, we could suddenly solve all our problems. Because there are all these lock-down point guards out there. Do the last two paragraphs sound rational? The problems with the Lakers right now are best solved internally, not externally. To put it simply, this is a championship roster, a deep roster loaded with talent at every position. The problem is not the makeup of the team. The problem with this team is mental — they are not playing hard every night, not playing smart for four quarters. It’s frustrating to watch because our coach likes to let his teams face adversity like this, likes to let them figure it out for themselves, to see that the roles he defined for them work if they just play them. That learning process can lead to painful lessons, but as you probably know from your own life those are the lessons that stick.”

Nakia Hogan of The Times-Picayune:  “Nike, which toned down its promotion of Bryant after his sexual assault case, had Bryant market its Hyperdunk sneaker for this past Summer Olympics, and the shoe company is expected to launch the fourth edition of the Zoom Kobe line next month. Meanwhile, Bryant also has picked up sponsorships from VitaminWater and a couple of video games — Sony’s NBA ‘07 and Activision’s Guitar Hero World Tour. Bryant said it was important for him to make a strong comeback off the court, not just for the money, but for his legacy. ‘It’s something that as you become older you become more aware of and the responsibility that comes along with that,’ Bryant said. ‘With your kids growing up you want to make sure that your father is remembered for what he really is and not for what people say he is. So it was important for me to get out there and show my personality and show what I am really about and what I am really like. And then if you want to pass judgment one way or the other, I’m fine with that.’”

Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel:  “Magic Coach Stan Van Gundy went to bat for Dwight Howard, who had been in foul trouble the past two games before Monday night’s meeting with Golden State. He said his all-star center was picking up ‘a lot of pretty ticky-tack fouls’ and suggested that big guys such as Howard are being officiated differently than perimeter players by the NBA. ‘I think (Howard) is very frustrated they way the game is being called right now,’ Van Gundy said. ‘It’s different in this league. The real good perimeter players seemed to really get the benefit of every call, any touch. The real good big guys, it seems it’s just the opposite. ‘That they let people do more in there. I think it’s part of the an ongoing thing — they won’t say that — but I think the league is trying to do everything it can to make it a perimeter league and not a post-up league.’”

Brew Hoop:  Back in black: The good and bad of the Bucks first 29 games

Ivan Carter of the Washington Post:  “Stevenson has drawn attention for a much-publicized verbal back-and-forth with Cavaliers star LeBron James during last season’s playoffs and he’s regularly booed on the road after giving his signature hand wave in front of his face after hitting a shot, but he’s also a player who doesn’t complain, plays unselfishly and is willing to play hurt. Throughout the streak, which began when he was with the Orlando, Stevenson has played through several injuries including a torn meniscus in his knee, badly sprained ankles and this season a bad hamstring. When asked why he continued to pull on a uniform and play every night regardless of how his body felt before a game earlier in the season, Stevenson shrugged. ‘I don’t know man, I just like to play,’ he said. ‘We get paid a lot of money to go out there and do our job and that’s what I do. I play.’ That attitude partially explains Tapscott’s reluctance to make a change.”

Bullets Forever:  “In typical Wizards fashion this season, the coaching staff somehow manages to bungle up even the simplest and most obvious of moves.  If I’m reading this correctly, it took DeShawn Stevenson himself to get Ed Tapscott to finally move him out of the starting lineup.  Nevermind that only Desmond Mason and Raja Bell have worse PERs than DeShawn this season, that DeShawn’s supposed defensive prowess completely disappeared this year and that, with tons of young guys behind him on a team that’s currently 4-21, his suckitude was blocking guys who may actually be able to improve in the future. Kudos to DeShawn for selflessly benching himself, but it never should have come to that.  If the anecdote is true (and it may not be, it’s possible Ed raised the topic in the meeting and DeShawn said he was okay with it), it just reaffirms the suspicion that the inmates are running the asylum.  There’s no real plan, only an unspoken worry of ‘alienating the veterans.’”

Dave McMenamin of NBA.com:  “Portland is the type of team that basketball fans latch onto for the three Cs: character, cap space and ceiling. Thanks to some savvy draft-night moves by general manager Kevin Pritchard (Tyrus Thomas for Aldridge, Randy Foye for Roy) and the purging of a few killer contracts (happy trails to Zach Randolph and Darius Miles), Portland has a lot of the first two Cs. There’s no telling just how high the third C is for this team. ‘Brandon and LaMarcus … you look at those two guys and see they’re great basketball players. But we sort of hang our hats on the fact that they’re great people,’ Pritchard said. ‘When you have great players who are great people, it trickles down to the rest of the players, the rest of the organization.’”

Terry Pluto of The Plain Dealer:  “The Cavs are 23-4 and started this season 1-2. That means they have won 22 of 24 games. The Cavs are 23-4, and that projects to 69-13. The Cavs are 23-4, and who’d dare dream that they’d start this fast? I’m throwing a flag on myself for getting carried away. I doubt they’ll win 69 games. Or 65. But 60? Could be. I write that as someone who was on the Cavs beat in 1988-89 and 1991-92, the two seasons they won a franchise-record 57 games. I saw more than 95 percent of those games. I loved that team with Brad Daugherty, Mark Price, Craig Ehlo, John Williams, Ron Harper (in 1988-89) and Larry Nance. Lenny Wilkens had them playing beautiful basketball with ball movement, superb spacing and a sense that the players liked each other. But this team can be better. ‘I agree,’ said Wayne Embry, the general manager who put those teams together.”

Benjamin Hochman of The Denver Post:  “‘Just because you had a long basketball career doesn’t mean you’re guaranteed to be a good coach or GM. You still have to be in those situations and learn on the job, learn from mistakes, just like you did as a player. Most players probably don’t understand all the work that goes into being a GM — dealing with players, agents, front-office people, salary cap, trying to decide what pieces to add. There’s a lot of stuff.’ Porter and Nuggets coach George Karl believe Billups has the traits that make a successful executive — the front office’s point guard, if you will. ‘I think he’s a thinker,’ Karl said. ‘He’s made his career playing with the brain and the intensity game, as much as the skill game. I think his respect and human qualities and competitiveness, there’s a lot of ‘A’ grades in his makeup, if you look at what makes a good general manager or personnel guy. I think he has a passion for the game, passion for the gym.’ Karl, though, pointed out that sometimes an exec who was too talented might have a skewed mind-set, thinking ‘the game is easier and more perfect than it is. And the guy who wasn’t any good is a lot better at looking at the game with a correct reality.’”

Rick Bonnell of The Charlotte Observer:  “You know that TV commercial where your problem gets fixed by pushing a big, red Easy Button? Boris Diaw is becoming the Charlotte Bobcats’ Easy Button. The problem all season has been scoring; they’re last in the NBA in that category by a wide margin. But in the five games Diaw has played here, the Bobcats average about eight more points and shoot 3.5percentage points better. It’s not just what Diaw does (post scoring, 3-point shooting and creative passing), it’s what he represents: His willingness to pass seems infectious, and addressed the Bobcats’ greatest need.”

Mike Monroe of the San Antonio Express-News:  “Nothing in sports is more difficult than turning around the mentality that infests losing situations that have become chronic. Little wonder that few interim coaches end up getting the job on a permanent basis. Natt’s approach to taking over the Kings might make him an exception. Schooled for nine seasons on Jazz coach Jerry Sloan’s bench, and another three under Cavs coach Mike Brown, he knows what succeeds in the NBA: Hard work, discipline and fundamentals. ‘I see this as a grand opportunity,’ Natt said. ‘I’ve been an assistant for a long time. As a head coach, you have the ability to mold a team. You’re making the decisions on what happens. ‘I sat there for a long time and watched, and learned from, some of the best. I know how to coach. I have confidence in my coaching. I’ve just never had the opportunity to do it, and I’m grateful that I have it now.’ Natt doesn’t see his job as teaching Xs and Os. Rather, he wants his players to know right from wrong.”

Kevin Sawyer for Detroit Bad Boys:  “At present, the Pistons rank 19th in defensive efficiency. Last year, this was a top five defensive squad. One might be tempted to attribute this to the growing pains associated with a new-look roster. Alas, the Denver Nuggets seem to have dodged that particular bullet. In fact, they are a top five defensive squad (tied with Houston). This after having lost former defensive player of the year Marcus Camby. This is unsurprising when you consider the degree to which opposing point guards have feasted on Allen Iverson’s defensive shortcomings. Since acquiring Iverson, starting point guards [1] are averaging 19.1 ppg on 54% shooting, with 5.8 assists, and 4.9 free throw attempts per game. It’s like playing Tony Parker over and over again. Last year? Opposing PGs averaged 10 ppg and 4.9 apg on 41% shooting, with 2.2 free-throw attempts per game. Only six PGs even scored 19 points in a game. During one seven game stretch, no starting PG hit a single free throw (Rajon Rondo missed his lone attempt).”

Michael Cunningham of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel:  “Watch Michael Beasley and it doesn’t take long to realize the Heat’s rookie forward has a special talent for finding a way to put the ball in the basket. It also becomes quickly apparent that when the ball goes in to Beasley, there’s a good chance it’s not coming back out. Among the 17 NBA rookies playing at least 20 minutes per game, Beasley, with 308 shots in 647 minutes, shoots at the highest rate (one attempt for every 2.1 minutes played). Only Dwyane Wade, the league’s leading scorer, shoots more often for the Heat (one attempt every 1.8 minutes) and no one else is close to Beasley. Meanwhile Beasley is tied for 15th in assists among rookies averaging 20 minutes or more. The rookies in that group who are equal or worse than Beasley in assists are all post-dwelling centers: Milwaukee’s Luc Mbah a Moute, Portland’s Greg Oden and New Jersey’s Brook Lopez.”

Adam Lauridsen for the San Jose Mercury News:  “In the winter of 2006-07, before the Warriors made their mad playoff run, we certainly didn’t enjoy the losing, but we expected it.  We anticipated mediocrity and got excited when our loyalty was rewarded with anything else.  We’ve returned to that point, only worse.  After the playoff run and our 48 win season, we actually have fresh memories of what it’s like to repeatedly win.  Since the fate of the team has swung so abruptly, there’s a lot more fire as we burn through all of the suddenly dashed expectations.  We don’t know exactly what went wrong given.  You can assign off-the-court blame to Rowell, Mullin, Nelson, Davis, or Jackson — but given that we’re all speculating about what happened behind closed doors, the best you can do besides connecting a few scattered dots is assign it generally where the buck stops: ownership. Social unrest typically occurs when a segment of society enjoys a rapid rise or suffers a sudden fall.  Our little basketball community of Warriors fans is no different.  The question now is what happens to that anger.”

Frank Isola of the Daily News:  “The record indicates that the Knicks are on a pace for another 33-win season, a modest total they’ve reached in two of the past four campaigns. But with one-third of the season complete, Mike D’Antoni believes that the Knicks are better than their 11-16 record and that they’ll get better results over the next four months. Not even an ugly loss to the Boston Celtics on Sunday could curb D’Antoni’s optimism. While the defending NBA champs are a lock to make the playoffs, the Knicks, according to D’Antoni, have the next six weeks to demonstrate that they also can qualify for the first time in five years. ‘The schedule is kinda in our favor,’ D’Antoni said. ‘Now we have to make up some ground. And if we do that, we’ll have a good shot. This next month and a half is going to be a telling point.’ Starting with Friday’s home game against Minnesota, 11 of the Knicks’ next 19 games are at the Garden - and only eight of the 19 are against teams that currently have winning records.”

Dave Feschuk of the Toronto Star:  “Phoenix, despite winning an average of 58 games during that wildly entertaining seven-seconds-or-less era, isn’t the only successful team that has put on the brakes. And why? Perhaps it’s because the defence-first Boston Celtics are the reigning champs. Perhaps it’s because the Suns never made it to the NBA final before they traded for Shaquille O’Neal and lost in the first round last year. Jim O’Brien, coach of the still-trying-to-push-it Indiana Pacers, has a different theory. ‘I think one of the reasons is that the officials are calling it differently this year,’ O’Brien was saying earlier this month. ‘They’ll deny this until they’re blue in the face, but they’ve changed around the way they’ve called the game. ‘There are not as many foul calls – I don’t know that statistically for a fact, but it seems that way.’ The statistical data doesn’t exactly shout ‘Bad Boys!’ But compared with 2005-06, when the league announced a clampdown on various forms of contact from hand-checking to the so-called ‘re-routing’ of cutters, fouls are down about 1.6 per game per team. Free-throw attempts are down nearly two a game per team over the same span. And, though it’s purely anecdotal, more than one NBA observer has pointed out that, while the referees are blowing the whistle less frequently, against-the-rulebook contact is on the rise. In other words, no-calls are up.”