» September 9, 2009 3:17 PM | By Brandon Hoffman
- Could Cablevision, which owns the Knicks, give LeBron James his own channel? That’s the word on the street, according to the Daily News’ Frank Isola: “The latest LeBron to the Knicks rumor I’ve heard is that Cablevision – which owns the Knicks but not the Daily News – will circumvent the salary cap by giving LeBron his own channel.”
- Geoff Calkins takes the Grizzlies to task for signing Allen Iverson: “Iverson was unhappy backing up Rip Hamilton in Detroit, understand. The man would be unhappy sharing minutes with God. If you think he’s going to merrily sit on the bench behind Conley and O.J. Mayo as the Grizzlies lose another 50 games, I have an Iverson workout video I’d like to sell you.”
- Ira Winderman: “Yes, Pat Riley said it. No, we don’t believe it. When it came to discussing next summer’s approach in free agency and the boatload of cash the Heat will carry into the process, the Heat president seemingly was working off a script when he said to the assembled media at AmericanAirlines Arena: ‘You’ve all picked the guys you want on this team and, for some reason, you don’t think we might want to sign three or four guys. Why don’t I want to spread it around to get two or three starters who fit better?’ Why? Why! Because you’re Pat Riley, and the Miami Heat system has always been a star system. It’s why you added Tim Hardaway to Alonzo Mourning. It’s why you brought in Shaquille O’Neal to join Dwyane Wade. It’s why you traded three-for-one for Jamal Mashburn and four-for-one for Brian Grant. It’s why you barely blinked when complementary pieces such as Eric Murdock, Bruce Bowen, Keyon Dooling, James Posey and Jason Kapono left without compensation in free agency. Riley knows better. The NBA is a league of stars.”
- Steve Luhm of The Salt Lake Tribune: “Jazz assistant, Gordon Chiesa, recalled an incident during the 1992 Western Conference finals against Portland when Stockton exhibited his ferocity and Sloan demonstrated his trust. ‘We ran a played called ‘fist one,’ where our point guard screens the other team’s four-man,’ Chiesa said. Stockton’s job? Set a pick on the Trail Blazers’ Buck Williams. ‘Buck is a man,’ Chiesa said. ‘I mean, he’s big and strong and he takes pride in guarding people. So John sets a screen and Buck takes his head off — I mean, just takes his head off. He looks like a bobblehead.’ A foul was called on Williams and a TV timeout sent both teams to their benches. Said Chiesa: ‘John comes over, looks Jerry in the eye and yells, ‘Don’t even think about not calling that play again.’ John thinks for a second, looks at Jerry again and says, ‘Call it again. Right now.’ So Jerry did.’ On the Jazz’s next possession, Chiesa said, ‘John sets a screen, stands Buck Williams straight up and Karl Malone gets a [three-point play]. Amazing.’ Layden often saw Stockton and Sloan sitting together on team flights, talking basketball. ‘John would walk back and they would discuss the game,’ Layden said. ‘They talked about how to get better — how our team could get better, what we needed to do to improve. To me, that was a wonderful thing.’”
- Seth Deveney at the Sporting News spoke with former Jazz center Mark Eaton about Stockton: “Suppose you were a player for the John Stockton-Karl Malone Jazz teams of the ’90s, and suppose you were feeling a bit of soreness flaring up in your knee just before a game. Not unbearable pain, but enough to give you a limp. And suppose you took that limp into the locker room. Well, there was one quick cure for that hitch in your step-a Stockton stare. ‘That was all it took,’ former Jazz center Mark Eaton said. ‘A guy would come limping into the locker room and he would get that look from John. All the sudden, the limp would go away. He didn’t need to say anything. But you knew the way things were in John’s eyes. If you could walk, you could play, and if you could play, you were 100 percent.’”
- Charley Rosen filed a scouting report on MJ, that includes this interesting bit of info: “Early in his career, Jordan’s primary deficiency on offense was his reluctance to accept the sacrifice required in the triangle. Time and again, the ball would stick to his hand while he faked, dribbled and re-faked, seeking to create his own scoring opportunities. He was encouraged in this regard by one of the Bulls’ assistant coaches, John Bach. It wasn’t until the Bulls were involved in their first championship series — versus the Lakers in 1991 — that he became a true believer in what he once called ‘a white man’s offense.’”
- Tom Ziller: “ESPN’s Marc Stein, in the process of breaking news that the NBA and the referee union have reached a stalemate in contract negotiations, and that a lockout (and a set of replacement refs) looks more likely than ever, wonders if commissioner David Stern is taking a hard line to put some fear into the players union, a group he and the NBA owners may need to lock out in two years. The facts certainly imply this is a scare job: Stein reports the league is pushing for a $3.2 million reduction of the total ref budget (a 10% cut), while the refs have said they will give up no more than $2.5 million (or 7.8%) total. That zone of disagreement — $700,000 — is, of course, small potatoes. It equates to some 0.02% of the total NBA revenue pot.”
- Sam Smith remembers Chicago’s 72-10 season: “Phil Jackson was pushing management to trade for Derrick Coleman, a 20 and 10 player with the New Jersey Nets, who’d worn out his welcome with questionable behavior and attitude. Jackson actually delighted in taking on the challenge of players others feared, given Jackson’s confidence in himself and his coaching methods. It’s why many believe only Jackson could take on a player like Ron Artest this season in Los Angeles. But management didn’t want to risk a chance on Coleman with three years left on his contract. The other player of interest was Dennis Rodman, the longtime Bulls nemesis in Detroit who’d led the league in rebounding with the Spurs. But Rodman had become a toxic with a mess with suspensions and aberrant behavior. He had seemed to cost the Spurs a chance at two championships, as Rodman dabbled in a bizarre image change with entertainer Madonna. He had a year left on his deal and the Spurs were desperate to be rid of him. GM Jerry Krause was dubious. But the feeling was it was worth the chance, and cheap at $2 million for one season. The Bulls would eventually deal Will Perdue for Rodman. If Rodman proved a distraction, they’d just cut him. Still, they wanted to run it by Jordan and Scottie Pippen. Jordan was enthusiastic, though he’d later admit he rarely, if ever, spoke with Rodman those three seasons because it was so difficult to get Rodman’s attention. I used to get letters from a southern Illinois educator who said Rodman was a classic case of undiagnosed and untreated Attention Deficit Disorder. Jordan would later say when he had to make a point to Rodman he’d grab him by both temples and demand Rodman look him in the eye and then ask him several times if he understood what Jordan was saying and to repeat if he did.”
Category: Chicago Bulls, Memphis Grizzlies, Miami Heat, Milwaukee Bucks, New Jersey Nets, New York Knicks, Points in the Paint, San Antonio Spurs, Utah Jazz
Tags: Allen Iverson, Bruce Ratner, Cablevision, David Robinson, David Stern, Dwyane Wade, James Dolan, John Stockton, Karl Malone, LeBron James, Mark Eaton, Michael Beasley, Michael Jordan, Oscar Robertson, Pat Riley, Phil Jackson, Rob Benson
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