Baron’s leading the charge…

What’s going on with the Jazz? After dropping three in a row to Lottery-bound squads Seattle, Portland and Sacramento — including blowing a 20-point fourth-quarter lead to the Sonics over the weekend — the Jazz went out last night and got every meal of the day handed to them by the Warriors. Stephen Jackson dropped 28 points, Al Harrington had 15 and 11 boards, and Baron Davis had 19 and 8 dimes for Golden State, who led by as much as 30 and tied the Clippers for the 8-seed out West … Midway through the fourth, Nellie put in Adonal Foyle, who got a standing O from the crowd and couldn’t contain his huge grin. Foyle proceeded to go in and get dunked on by skinny rookie Ronnie Brewer in about 10 seconds … Deron Williams might have played his worst game of the year (4 pts, 3 asts, 3 turnovers, 4 fouls) for the Jazz, who are slipping in our updated NBA Hit List … The Clippers, meanwhile, got popped in Dallas. Elton Brand had the highlight of the game when he dropped the hammer on DeSagana Diop and Jerry Stackhouse, but Dirk’s 26 points and Stack’s 18 lifted the Mavs to the W … Right before Pistons/Knicks tipped off and the reality sunk in that Chauncey Billups and Rip Hamilton would line up across a New York backcourt of Nate Robinson and Mardy Collins, PR summed it up simply: “Child abuse.” It was starting to look super ugly at first; C-Webb strolled down the lane untouched for a finger roll on Detroit’s first possession, and Rip got a wide-open backdoor layup on the next trip. Isiah had to take a timeout one minute into the game … To their credit, though, Nate (24 pts) and Mardy (10 pts, 6 asts, 3 steals) weren’t shook. Nate went at Chauncey and actually blew right past him a few times going to the rack, and as fugly as Mardy’s jumper is, he wasn’t shy with the trigger. The Knicks lost, of course, but the kids showed some heart. Chauncey dropped 22, while Rip had 19 … All throughout the game the Knicks announcers were talking about how bored the Pistons looked, yet they were still cruising with a comfortable lead most of the night … In the first half, NYK play-by-play guy Mike Breen was talking about how the Pistons are very communicative on the court. Clyde Frazier then blurted out, “The crowd is so quiet they can talk to each other!” … On one play, Tayshaun Prince cut to the basket while Channing Frye and Jared Jeffries cracked heads, leaving Prince wide-open for a bucket. While Jeffries didn’t even react to the hit and kept running around while bleeding above his eye, Channing stopped in his tracks and doubled over. Not sure what that says about the two of them, but it just stood out to us … Marcus Camby pulled down 22 boards (with 7 blocks) in Denver’s win over the Lakers, in part because Kobe gave him plenty of chances. Kobe shot 9-for-30, scoring 23 while ‘Melo had 33. If this scoring race leads to one of those David Thompson/George Gervin last-day-of-the-season shootouts, how many shots could Mamba jack up in one game? 50? … Anthony Parker gave the Wolves 24 points, and T.J. Ford (17 pts, 10 asts) and Chris Bosh (16 pts, 13 rebs) had double-doubles as the Raps got a little closer to taking over the No. 2 seed in the East from Cleveland/Chicago … Yao Ming scared half (or all) of Houston again when he went down grabbing his elbow after a flagrant foul by Nick Collison last night. T-Mac got in Nick’s face and an everyone-stand-around-and-glare situation jumped off. In the middle of everything, Sonics color guy Lenny Wilkens cracked, “Better be careful, Van Gundy might grab somebody’s leg!” … Later on, Lenny said a cross-court pass from one corner to the other was the hardest pass to make in basketball. A couple minutes later, he said an entry pass from the top of the key was the toughest pass … The Sonics fought to stay in it, but fell short. On what was essentially the dagger, Shane Battier went horizontal to save a loose ball and tapped it to Rafer Alston, who looked at Shane like he was nuts. On the other end Yao scored over Collison and made it a nine-point game. And that’s why every coach would love to have Battier on their team … A couple random things from the Dime headquarters: Aaron Gray dropped by on Monday, and Justin played pickup ball while rocking some “ice” … We’re out like the New York crowd …