» March 5, 2009 6:56 PM | By Brandon Hoffman
- Dave Hyde of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel: “Heat forwards Udonis Haslem and Dorell Wright are two of the three members of the 2006 championship team still on the roster. They went down to O’Neal during warm-ups and greeted him. Wade never did. He did the perfunctory man-hug before the game with O’Neal that he did with all the Phoenix starters. There was a reason for this. ‘My grandma always said, ‘You forgive, but you don’t forget,’‘ Wade said. ‘And I live by those words. I forgive a lot of guys. I’m that kind of person. But I don’t forget what he said, either.’” Shaq knocked Wade to the floor last night and instead of helping his former teammate up, O’Neal stood over him as Wade lay sprawled across the court. I read about the play in one or two game recaps this morning, but assumed that O’Neal’s stare was a momentary thing. Basketbawful has video of the incident. Shaq stands over Wade for a good 6 seconds before Wade’s teammates arrive to help him up. Classy move Shaq. I touched on O’Neal’s comments about Stan Van Gundy in today’s Scoop du Jour.
- Tyson Chandler: “I want every single person that comes here to my blog to sign up for my Twitter feed (http://twitter.com/tysonchandler). I’m only 149,500 people away from Shaq! I was thinking about dissing Shaq on his Twitter. Something to make him come back to mine. That’s how it happens on the street. I feel like when rappers start a beef that their album sales go up. So I’m going to start a beef with Shaq and maybe I’ll get more Twitter hits. I hope he doesn’t take it personal though. Rappers just talk. I actually have to see Shaq in a couple weeks.” Given everything that’s transpired over the last two weeks, I don’t think that’s a good idea…
- John Hollinger on Brandon Roy: “One thing he’s added this season is a vastly improved ability to get to the rim and finish, something he and McMillan credit to an offseason strength program. Roy is shooting 56.9 percent in the immediate basket area, a phenomenal mark for a guard, and has taken 42.0 percent of his attempts from that distance this season — compared to only 34.2 percent last season. Similarly, he’s drawn .397 free throw attempts per field goal attempt this season, compared to .297 last season. ‘He’s expanded his game,’ McMillan said. ‘He was a jump shooter, and he tried to work on his body to get stronger so he could get more contact. [And] he’ll learn how to get to the free throw line more. I don’t think he’s reached his full potential.’ I have to underscore just how rare this is. Normally the proportion of a player’s attempts in the basket area will decrease with age, as his athleticism slowly declines and his shooting slowly improves. It takes a very strong will to fly in the face of those trends and increase the proportion of basket-area attempts as one’s career goes on.”
- Sam Amick of the Sacramento Bee: “The Kings aren’t alone when it comes to the cutbacks we keep talking about in the paper. It truly has become a league-wide trend, and we’ll likely have a larger story on that reality soon. I mentioned a few more in Tuesday’s paper, and inadvertently left a relevant cutback out off the list: The Maloofs are flying commercial. That’s right, the Kings’ co-owners are done with the pricey, private jets and are bouncing in and out of airports with the rest of us when traveling from Sacramento to Los Angeles to Las Vegas and wherever else their endeavors take them. And from what I’m told, their airline of choice is Southwest. On the downside, the security lines, baggage claim delays and tightly compacted seats certainly elicit some culture shock.” (Via Sactown Royalty)
- Matt Watson of FanHouse: “Allen Iverson still hasn’t taken questions from the media since being informed by Michael Curry that he lost his starting job. He returned to Detroit early to have his back examined as his teammates finished up their road trip last weekend, and when his teammates returned home, he flew to Washington D.C. to receive another medical opinion. Eventually he received a diagnosis he accepted: he officially has a ‘sore back’ and will miss two weeks. His back will prevent him from traveling with the team but apparently won’t keep him housebound: while his teammates hosted the Nuggets on Tuesday, Iverson was allegedly spotted enjoying the D.C. club scene.”
- Dwyane Wade on how the Most Valuable Player award should be determined: “Most Valuable player to his team, simple as that,” he said. “I’m not taking anything from Kobe last year. I thought he was unbelievable. I thought he should have won MVPs in previous years. But I thought Chris Paul was the most valuable player to his team last year, from the way he played and what he meant to that team. You’ve got to take a guy off a team and say, ‘If he wasn’t on there, how would this team be?’ and see everything he brings to his team. That’s my interpretation of what a most valuable player is. But everyone has their different takes.” I agree with Wade. Team success should not be the barometer by which an individual player is considered to be of most value to his team. Rather than award the title of Most Valuable Player to the best player on the top team, it should go to the NBA player who is of most value to his particular team, with less significance placed upon that team’s win-loss record. Basketball is a team sport. No one player can win consistently without the luxury of a quality-supporting cast. Wade is putting up monster numbers in Miami. I think he’s worth 15-20 wins for the Heat. However, I feel the same way about LeBron James’ worth to the Cleveland Cavaliers. James has a superior supporting cast, but his cast would win roughly 40 games without him. The Cavs are on pace to win 60 games this season. Kevin Ding of the Orange County Register wrote a column recently that declared the MVP award was LeBron’s to lose. I think the Cavaliers will have to finish behind Los Angeles and Boston for Kobe Bryant or Dwyane Wade to make up enough ground on James. If Wade comes up short, he can always take solace in the story of Wilt Chamberlain. Many people know that Chamberlain averaged 50 points and 25 rebounds during the 1961-62 season, but few people realize that the MVP was awarded to Bill Russell that year. Wilt’s crime? The Celtics — led by three of the fifty greatest players of all-time (Russell, Bob Cousy, & Sam Jones) won 11 more games than the Sixers.
Category: Boston Celtics, Detroit Pistons, Miami Heat, NBA Issues, New Orleans Hornets, Orlando Magic, Philadelphia 76ers, Phoenix Suns, Points in the Paint, Sacramento Kings
Tags: Allen Iverson, Bill Russell, Boston Celtics, Brandon Roy, Detroit Pistons, Dwyane Wade, Gavin Maloof, Joe Maloof, Miami Heat, MVP Award, NBA Issues, NBA Teams, New Orleans Hornets, Orlando Magic, Philadelphia 76ers, Phoenix Suns, Points in the Paint, Sacramento Kings, Shaquille O'Neal, Stan Van Gundy, Tyson Chandler, Wilt Chamberlain
Discuss in Forum
March 6th, 2009 at 12:30 am
There are several NBA personas I tolerate more than I respect: Carmelo Anthony, Allen Iverson, Mark Cuban, and Shaq. They’ve all managed to find themselves in the news as of late.
By the way, Dwayne Wade has got some REALLY BAD advice from his grandma. I’d hate to be married to Wade; forgetting is part of truly forgiving.