Matt Steinmetz of The Examiner: “There is no doubt now that Ellis is on his way back. He’s smack dab in the middle of two-hour-a-day rehabs and is slowly working toward his return from a left ankle injury suffered in an offseason moped crash. Maybe he’ll come back in mid-January … maybe at the end of January … maybe February. Nobody really knows, but everyone is starting to realize it’s on the way. What is also unknown is the impact Ellis will make upon his return. But one thing is certain: Stephen Jackson will have a huge role in it. So much of where the Warriors go after Ellis returns will come down to Jackson. And, truth be told, Ellis’ return is the Warriors’ last and best chance this season to turn 2008-09 into something positive. When Ellis returns it is imperative that he becomes the team’s go-to guy and No. 1 option. Ellis needs to go right to the head of the class in that department, and it must be Jackson who ushers him there.”
Jason Quick of The Oregonian: “By the end of the game, Aldridge had finished with 20 points, seven rebounds, two blocks, two assists and two steals. When the final buzzer sounded, the Blazers rushed the court and confetti fell from the rafters. Many of his teammates hugged Aldridge, knowing that he carried them on a big night. But Aldridge for many moments ignored them. He stood rigid as his teammates wrapped around his torso, and stared intently down the court. He was staring at Garnett, … wanting, hoping, needing eye contact. He got none, as Garnett, with his head bowed, walked off the court, fiddling with his jersey. Aldridge shrugged off the final scene. ‘Just two competitive players going at it,’ Aldridge said. ‘He goes his way, I go mine.’ I will forever remember that scene. For many, they will look back at this night as the game the Blazers beat the NBA champions without Roy. I will look back at it as the night Aldridge shed a label.”
Vince Ellis of the Detroit Free Press: “‘It’s just looking at the bigger picture,’ Iverson said. ‘I’ve had four scoring titles, I’ve scored over 23,000 points, I’ve had 50-point games, a 60-point game. ‘I’ve done a lot of things when it comes to scoring the basketball, but I just have a bigger goal, and those things don’t mean much to me like they used to.’ Pistons coach Michael Curry said that realization can take some time to hit a player because money and All-Star games serve as more of a motivator for younger players. ‘That’s kind of what guys look at to validate who they are as a pro player,’ Curry said Tuesday after the team’s short workout. ‘Another kind of validation is if I can get a max contract or I’m an All-Star kind of validates that I’m a great young player in this league.’ But, ultimately, great players realize that a ring goes a long way toward truly leaving an imprint on the game.”
Ken Berger of CBSSports.com: “Once Hamilton is healthy, the best candidate to go to the bench is Iverson. If Iverson looked at it objectively, he would see the benefit of reinventing himself as a killer sixth man, bringing instant offense off the bench the way Manu Ginobili does in San Antonio or Lamar Odom does in L.A. During the sometimes helter-skelter possessions that ensue with the second units on the floor at the end or beginning of quarters, Iverson would be a perfect fit to score buckets in bunches. Despite the beating he’s endured over the years, he can still get to the basket and create his own shot with the best of them. He’s also been a gambling steal-producer on defense his entire career — not a sound, team-concept defender, which the Pistons need during the more structured portions of games. The problem is, Iverson has never outgrown his desire to be on the floor 40-plus minutes every night. Every coach who has ever substituted for him can attest to the fact that you can’t take Iverson out of a game without a dirty look and a few dirty words.”
Scott Howard-Cooper of the Sacramento Bee: “Once Williams quit, league officials, not wanting their own version of some Brett Favre retirement dance with the Packers, said Williams must sit out one calendar year. If he then decides he wants to play again, he must petition the Board of Governors for re-instatement. If that approval comes, the Clippers would then have the first shot at him, 72 hours to make a good-faith offer, presumably something close to the deal from summer ‘08. At a time when teams begin shopping the sort-of retired / sort-of free-agent list — P.J. Brown, Robert Horry, Dikembe Mutombo — as part of ramping up for the second half and the playoffs, Williams is not an option. So much as calling his agent, Dan Tobin, to guage interest could be tampering. There would be interest if he could un-retire on the spot and if he wanted to un-retire. Point guards with championship experience are serious commodities. But it is moot for now because Williams has shown no desire to get back on the carousel.”
Bob Young of The Arizona Republic: “Though the improvement in Shaquille O’Neal’s free-throw shooting improvement is a lot more important to the Suns, we noticed that Steve Nash was hitting at a career-best 93.8 percent clip through Monday. Nash trails only Mark Price and Rick Barry on the all-time NBA career free-throw-shooting charts. Price hit 90.4 percent of his attempts, and Barry made an even 90 percent. Through Monday, Nash had a career percentage of 89.9 from the line. This made us wonder whether Nash could overtake Price for the all-time lead. Well, he won’t get there this season, even at his current rate. Assuming Nash gets 245 attempts – which is about the pace he is on and is about what he’s averaged the two previous seasons – and converts at 93.8 percent, he would finish the season with 230 free throws, giving him 2,475 in 2,743 career attempts.”
Mavs Moneyball: “I don’t know what was more disturbing this morning, seeing the Dallas Morning News’ Eddie Sefko use the phrase ‘getting in the opposing player’s grill’ or his overall point that the Mavs defense is improving. Wes nailed the truth earlier on this very blog: The Mavs defense has been incredibly inconsistent all year. In fact, compared to the rest of the league, it’s actually gotten worse. For most of the season the Mavs’ defensive efficiency has been on the lower end of the top ten in the league, roughly 8-10. Certainly not bad, but not nearly as good as it has been over the past two years. However, despite what both coach Rick Carlisle and Sefko say, the Mavs defense has recently dropped to 12th in the league. Of course, too much can be made of league rankings, and that’s the case here.”
Steve Bulpett of the Boston Herald: “Rivers was asked what he’d like to work on in practice. ‘Oh, the list is too long,’ he said. ‘Timing mostly, defensively and offensively. You know, the more you practice the better your timing gets.’ Despite owning the best record in the league, Rivers sees slippage. ‘Oh, yeah, it’s been tremendous,’ he said. ‘But it was expected. There’s nothing you can do about it. With this group, they’re pretty professional and they do it as well as anybody with no practice – any team I’ve ever been around. I think (the problems) started long before the (19-game winning) streak ended because we had a ton of games. And the winning helps, but it can get you thinking you’re a little better than what you are, as far as where you’re at at that time. I mean, it happens with everyone and we understand that, and it’s all correctable. Slippage and winning is a good problem. Slippage and losing is a bad problem.’”
CelticsBlog: “The Celtics are still one of the few legitimate contenders for the Championship and I still think we will end up winning it all this year. However, that doesn’t mean that we can gloss over a 1-3 road trip and pretend that nothing is wrong. Sure, we have the banner from last year, but honestly that doesn’t buy us anything but a little bit of swagger this year. And I’m not sure that swagger has been all good. Maybe the team had started believeing in the hype after a 27-2 start. They are human after all, and it is very possible that they have been suffering from a bit of overconfidence.”
Phil Miller of the Pioneer Press: “Kevin McHale and Rick Carlisle were Boston Celtics teammates for three seasons in the mid-1980s and remain good friends, so ‘it’ll be nice to look down there and see Rick,’ said McHale, the Timberwolves coach. He didn’t get to look for long, though. Carlisle, in his first season coaching the Dallas Mavericks, was ejected with 6:30 remaining in the first half, receiving two quick technical fouls when he stormed to midcourt to confront referee Gary Zielinski about a Wolves steal that Carlisle believed should have been a foul. Carlisle and McHale are just two of a half-dozen NBA coaches to play for the Celtics’ 1986 championship team. Danny Ainge, Larry Bird, Dennis Johnson and Sam Vincent also walked the sideline at some point, though McHale said that isn’t a big surprise considering the intellects on those Celtics teams, which won a pair of NBA titles in the ’80s. ‘That was a team that had a bunch of guys that really knew how to play basketball,’ McHale said. ‘Later on in my career, when you had new guys come in, you realized how blessed you really were. Because you’d say, ‘Hey, let’s change this coverage,’ and they’d look at you like, ‘What?’ And you’d say, ‘Oh, boy.’”
Doug Smith of the Toronto Star: “Maybe it takes a fluke basket at the buzzer. Maybe they find a way to get a blowout where the other team misses shots of every conceivable nature. Maybe it’s a forfeit or something equally ridiculous. It doesn’t matter to them how they get it but the Raptors need a win as much as they need to draw their next breath. ‘I’ve got to say, yeah, we are getting closer but we have to start winning, too,’ was how Jose Calderon put it after the latest setback, a 117-111 road loss to the Golden State Warriors on Monday. ‘We cannot be getting closer every day and still be losing. It’s good and we’re going to keep working for sure but we have to start winning games.’ The fragile mental state of the Raptors hasn’t manifested itself in any great public way as they’ve fallen to 12-19 on the season after going 2-4 on the longest road trip of the season, but there’s an overriding feeling that some kind of explosion is imminent. In the quiet of the locker room after Monday’s loss – a defeat made more difficult to swallow because a late rally was wasted after some inexplicably bad shooting – the talk centred on the mood of the team rather than any tactical issues.”
Sekou Smith of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “Pacers coach Jim O’Brien might have summed it up best late Tuesday when he said, ‘Clearly the Atlanta Hawks have become a very, very good basketball team.’ After years of prodding from coach Mike Woodson, the Hawks have finally developed the defensive mentality he has been pushing. The Hawks are 18-4 this season in games in which they hold the opposition under 100 points. ‘I think if you watch us play, no matter who is out there, we’re at our best when we’re defending and rebounding on defense and sharing the ball on offense,’ second-year Hawks center Al Horford said. ‘It’s not anything complicated. When we stick to who we are, the defense and rebounding, I think we’re capable of playing with anybody.’ And there’s definitely something to the sharing the ball mentality. Johnson is the Hawks’ workhorse, averaging 23.4 points per game, but he’s also the leader in assists (5.7). When he shares the ball the Hawks are unbeatable, they’re 8-0 in games in which he has had eight or more assists.”
Fran Blinebury of the Houston Chronicle: “‘I felt a lot of pressure,’ Mutombo said. ‘Yao Ming ($15 million) and Tracy (McGrady, $21 million), every day calling me, (saying), ‘We need you. We need your leadership in the locker room. We need your spirit, something to get us going.’ Any more questions about why the Rockets can’t be taken seriously as true contenders? Mutombo is as classy a person and as fierce a competitor as you’ll ever want to meet. His off-the-court work in the name of charity is selfless and genuine. His on-the-court work is often inspiring. But Mutombo is 42 years old and over the past two seasons has played less than 17 minutes a game. That includes increased playing time over the final 26 games of last season when Yao was out with a broken bone in his foot. To say that what has been lacking is the part-time contribution of a 17-year NBA veteran who pretty much plays at just one end of the court, is simply missing the forest for the trees.”
Stephon Marbury for Newsday: “I could understand the fact they didn’t want Chris Duhon looking over his shoulder but if you don’t want me, just pay me and let me go. I just want to play basketball. I sat on the bench for a whole month and didn’t say one word. It wasn’t easy because I love to play but that’s the nature of the biz. Then they made a trade and needed 8 guys and coach told me he had a certain number of minutes. I was cool. My jersey was never hung in my locker though so I never refused to play. Things were never handled properly. Through it all, I respected their business position to go in another direction just like they have to respect my business position that I have a contract and obligated to pay me. It’s the principle of the whole thing. It’s really not about the money but it’s about the money. Feel me?”
Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel: “‘He pretty much had all the influence on me in the world because I knew if he could make it into the NBA, I could make it into the NBA,’ Brian said. ‘I was born with a ball in my crib. I made my first shot when I was 3. My dad was off playing overseas. He’d come back in the summer until he started to get sick and we weren’t able to see him again.’ When Norm Cook finally came back to Lincoln at age 24, he started showing signs of mental illness. Joyce Cook told Sports Illustrated in 1997 that her husband physically abused her. She said that he believed other suitors were pursuing her and nailed windows of their home shut, refusing to let her leave the house. When Brian was 5, authorities from a mental hospital took his father away in a straitjacket.”
Ira Winderman of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel: “Considering the time they spent together leading to the 2003 NBA Draft and then their years as two-time Olympic teammates, James and Wade have come to consider themselves family. ‘For about an hour and a half, for whatever I was there, I just enjoyed it,’ Wade said. ‘They brought out the cake, sang Happy Birthday.’ But, Wade said, there was no second chorus. ‘They skipped the how-old-are-you part,’ Wade said with a smile. ‘I was wondering why they skipped that part.’ The joke, of course, is James looks well beyond his 24 years, with Tuesday his actual birthday.”
Brian Windhorst of The Cleveland Plain Dealer: “Most of the players and coaches had family members supporting them, taking advantage of a special privilege the Cavs give to their players. Unlike the vast majority of NBA teams, the Cavs permit immediate family members to travel on the team jet and stay at the team hotel. Though players can use the offer any time until the playoffs, each season the team members generally decide on a family trip when most bring loved ones. With it being the holidays, the warm weather in South Florida and some off days around the game, Tuesday was selected as the trip. With it also being LeBron James’ 24th birthday, many were expected to attend his birthday party following Tuesday’s game with the Heat. The Cavs stayed overnight following the game. The Cavs and San Antonio Spurs are the two teams who permit such travel, with every team flight available to family members.”
John Hollinger of ESPN.com: “Four teams — the Celtics, the Cavs, the Lakers and the Magic — are running roughshod over the league, with a combined record of 103-20. Each of the four projects to win at least 58 games and has had 100 percent Playoff Odds for several days now. Beyond them, there’s a yawning gap before we get to the contenders for No. 5. The Hawks moved into the fifth spot in the Power Rankings after Monday’s 109-91 win over the Nuggets, but the Hawks’ 104.3 rating is well behind the fourth-place Magic’s 107.8. In fact, the Hawks are closer to the 14th-place Spurs (101.7) than they are to the No. 4 Magic. Coincidentally, Atlanta and San Antonio have identical 20-10 marks, good for fifth-best in the league as of Monday.”
Mike Bresnahan and Broderick Turner of the Los Angeles Times: “The Lakers’ 10-time All-Star stares at his 10-inch screen, watching basketball clips of the players he’ll be guarding. It is part of his longtime commitment to studying video, one of the foundations of a career still going strong in its 13th season. The Lakers have had their stars over the last few decades — Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Jerry West, Shaquille O’Neal — but few have studied game video (or film, as it was called back in the day) more diligently than Bryant, who looks for the slightest advantage while sizing up an opponent. ‘Hands down, he’s the biggest video fiend we’ve ever had,’ said Chris Bodaken, the Lakers’ director of video services. ‘I didn’t know if it was possible to be more competitive than Magic was, but I think he might be. It carries over into his preparation, and this is part of that.’”
John McMullen of The Sports Network: “Chuck has always courted controversy. There was the spitting incident in New Jersey, the throwing of a patron through a window at a Milwaukee bar and his famous ‘I am not a role model’ Nike commercial. Most recently, Barkley sparred with Cleveland Cavaliers superstar LeBron James, telling ‘King James’ to shut up instead of discussing his options when he becomes a free agent in 2010. James responded by calling Barkley ‘stupid.’ Barkley is certainly a lot of things but stupid isn’t one them. That’s why I don’t understand why Barkley can defend losing millions of dollars on casino gambling by saying he has the money and doesn’t plan to stop. I don’t understand why Barkley, by his own admission, carries a registered loaded gun in his car at all times. And I sure don’t understand why Barkley was arrested for driving under the influence in suburban Phoenix early Wednesday morning.”
