Ken Berger of CBSSports.com: “‘He’s fine,’ said a person who has been in regular contact with Arenas this summer. ‘He’s doing great.’ But some of the players Arenas has been running with at Attack Athletics — formed by Grover, who famously trained Michael Jordan — have been more effusive in their praise. It has been an unofficial All-Star week in Chicago, with stars, former stars and future stars — Arenas, LeBron James, Chicago native Dwyane Wade and O.J. Mayo, to name a few — running the floor at Grover’s place. But Arenas, one of the NBA’s best showmen, has left the news-breaking to others. ‘Runs at attack were pretty good today,’ Andre Iguodala wrote on Twitter. ‘gilbert arenas is back like he left his black card!’ ‘he aint lyin yall!!’ Quentin Richardson replied. ‘Thats real!’ The Wizards hope so. And I certainly hope so. If and when we are treated to the pop-culture phenomenon that is a healthy, productive, winning, All-Star-caliber Gilbert Arenas, we will once again have placed in front of us a never-ending itinerary of entertainment and Agent Zero-isms.”
Charles F. Gardner of the Journal Sentinel: “Milwaukee native Devin Harris isn’t bashful when it comes to talking about his role with the New Jersey Nets. Vince Carter is gone, sent to Orlando this summer in a cost-cutting trade that has left the Nets with zero members of their former Big Three. Before Carter left the Meadowlands scene, it was Richard Jefferson going to the Milwaukee Bucks (for one season) and Jason Kidd being shipped to Dallas in the deal that brought Harris to the Nets. ‘It’s my team now,’ Harris said Thursday during a break in his weeklong basketball camp at Milwaukee North Division High School. ‘Obviously, they wouldn’t have moved Vince until they felt I was ready. That’s kind of the burden I’m dealt with, but I’m excited about it. Any true point guard that has a chance to be the man on his team, he relishes that.’”
Vincent M. Mallozzi of The New York Times: “If Dwyane Wade gets his wish, he will never become a Knick. ‘I want to be in Miami, and I hope everything works out that way,’ Wade said Thursday. ‘I want to be one of those players that stays with one franchise for his entire career.’ Wade, along with LeBron James, Chris Bosh, Dirk Nowitzki and a slew of other marquee players, is likely to become a free agent in 2010, one the Knicks and several other N.B.A. teams will surely covet. But earlier Thursday at the Izod Center in East Rutherford, N.J., where Wade took part in the filming of a movie, he sounded like a man who had no interest in shopping himself on the free market. ‘Next year will be a big year for myself and for the team, but the plan has always been to stay with the Heat, and that’s still the plan,’ he said. ‘I think everything will work out.’”
Fred Kerber of the New York Post: “Time heals all wounds. And regarding Courtney Lee, the Nets hope the time is coming very soon. According to Dwight Howard, Lee’s good friend on the Magic, the young 6-foot-5 wing still is hurting about being traded from Orlando to the Nets. Howard said he spoke with Lee Wednesday. ‘He’s still a little bit upset about getting traded,’ said Howard, who was at the Meadowlands where filming continued on the Queen Latifah-Common movie, ‘Just Wright,’ yesterday. ‘I told him he needs to make the best out of the situation. Learn from it and just use whatever he thinks is negative as a positive for motivation. To come here and get better.’ Lee, a Magic Finals starter against the Lakers, was the primary piece for the Nets in the Vince Carter draft night trade. The Nets sent Carter and Ryan Anderson to the Magic for Lee, Rafer Alston and Tony Battie. Lee is one of the young rebuilding stallions in the Nets stable along with Devin Harris, Brook Lopez and Yi Jianlian. ‘He’s hurting. He’s not just upset, he’s hurting,’ Howard said.”
Mark Murphy of the Boston Herald: “Even after receiving clearance from the Cleveland medical staff, and despite a grueling summer of work with Los Angeles-based trainerJudy Seto, Powe is not expected back until February. He last talked with a member of the Celtics organization last month while attending ex-teammate Kendrick Perkins’ wedding in Houston. Though his chances of re-signing with the Celtics slimmed the moment the team didn’t extend a qualifying offer on June 30, Powe still tried to plead his case with Celtics co-owner Steve Pagliuca. ‘I talked to him for 45 minutes,’ said Powe, ‘but he said they weren’t going to do nothing. It was quite a shock to me, but he said they didn’t have the extra money to sign me, and (Pagliuca) said that he would have to pay out of his own pocket for them to wait on me. I understood what he was saying, because it was the same thing I heard from Danny (Ainge). I told Danny that I would take the one-year deal, but that was it. After (talking to Pagliuca), I didn’t call them no more.’”
Mike Wells of the Indianapolis Star: “Jeff Foster put his college education on hold 10 years ago so he could focus on his NBA career after his senior season at Texas State University. Today in front of about 20 friends and family members, the Indiana Pacers center will receive a degree in applied arts and sciences at a ceremony in San Marcos, Texas. ‘I promised myself and I promised my family that I would get this finished,’ said Foster, who was three classes shy of a degree when he left. ‘I dropped all my classes except one the final semester there because I had to get ready for the draft. Once we had kids, I really realized I needed to get this done.’ Foster has earned millions of dollars during his 10-year career. Will he ever use his degree? ‘You never know,’ he said. ‘If I do, I have it and I can say I went back and finished up something I always said I would do.’”
Josh Robbins of the Orlando Sentinel: “The Orlando Magic reached the NBA Finals last year, but the Cleveland Cavaliers and the Boston Celtics will be the teams to beat in the Eastern Conference this upcoming season. That’s the conclusion that can be drawn from an Orlando Sentinel poll of 11 NBA experts asked to rank the conference’s teams from top to bottom. With the flurry of free-agent signings mostly over, the time seemed right to take stock. The Cavaliers finished first in the overall rankings, just ahead of the Celtics. Boston, however, received six first-place votes while Cleveland was ranked first on five ballots. The Magic placed third overall. They were ranked as the conference’s second-best team on four ballots. So what happened? Aren’t the Magic the defending Eastern Conference champions? Didn’t they eliminate the Celtics and the Cavaliers during the playoffs? The voters think Orlando will miss Hedo Turkoglu and will need time to adjust to a roster filled with new players.”
Tom Canavan of the Associated Press: “With no big-names on their roster following the trades of Jason Kidd and Vince Carter over the past 18 months, the New Jersey Nets have taken a novel approach to ticket sales this season — they’re marketing LeBron, Kobe, K.G., Dwyane and Dwight Howard. The Nets on Thursday announced a special 10-game ‘Match-Up’ ticket plan through which their fans can also get a collection of reversible jerseys with the uniforms of LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, Dwyane Wade and Howard on one side and the jersey of the Nets’ player that will match up against the visiting star on the other. Fans who purchase two sets of tickets under the plan will get one set of five jerseys. ‘The reality of the situation is that we target the casual sports fan in New Jersey and New York, ‘ Nets chief executive Brett Yormark said. ‘As much as they like the Nets, they also like the opposing star players. The Match-Up plan enables us to market our players as well as the star players in the league. We’re a young team, the NBA is a league of stars, and we’re not ashamed to say that our fans are coming to watch the opposing star players as much as ours.’”
