I’d imagine that everything in Cleveland is so wonderful right now. The Cavs are 36-1 at home, Barack Obama picked them to go to the Finals, flowers are in bloom, Drew Carey is skipping around the streets holding hands with Mimi… you get the picture.

It’s gotten so good in Cleveland that the “LeBron in 2010″ worries have turned upside down. When Cavs’ owner Dan Gilbert was pressed on the question per usual recently, he suggested that there’s a “one-in-a-million” chance that LBJ will leave his home city. Read More »

I really never thought we’d get to this point. In recent days when headlines have popped up around the sports blog-o-sphere, I thought that the media was kind of blowing the Allen Iverson-to-the-bench issue out of proportion. But it turns out that he really is as upset as writers say he is. That doesn’t mean that AI is being a baby, though. This dude cares so much about playing his best and winning, he’s worked himself into a dither. Read More »

Like we told you in Smack this morning, in last night’s Kings/Warriors game, Kevin Martin and Monta Ellis almost put up 100 points just by themselves. Martin’s line was absurd - dude dropped 50 points on just 11 field goals (11-22 from the field).

So of course who takes the potential game-winner in overtime for Sacramento while Martin was relegated to standing in the corner? Read More »

The Bobcats almost pulled off the NBA version of running a gauntlet of the original Four Horsemen: beating the Lakers and Celtics on consecutive nights. After shutting down L.A. on Tuesday, the ‘Cats went to Boston last night and had the Celtics on the ropes multiple times, but couldn’t seal the deal and lost in double-overtime. Read More »

Did I miss the episode of “Magic Tricks Revealed” where the Secret Magician showed everyone how to doctor video of long-distance basketball shots? After Kevin Love, LeBron, The Professor and even Jimmy Kimmel did their thing in the past few months, here’s Greg Oden‘s ultimate H-O-R-S-E shot. (Speaking of random trends, can anyone explain why 3-D just got popular again? Is this another off-shoot of the whole ’80s revival?)

With the Sixers trying to hang onto the 6th seed in the East playoff race, this isn’t what they needed. Thaddeus Young turned his ankle during last night’s win over Atlanta, and will reportedly be sidelined 2-3 weeks with a sprain and a bone bruise. With two weeks left in the regular season, that means one of Philly’s key players could miss time in the playoffs — if they don’t lose their spot altogether. Read More »

On paper, the Rockets have lost two of their five best players since the start of this season. Conventional wisdom would say that their hope to break out of “first-round playoff purgatory” is now a longer shot than ever before.

But like Daryl Morey‘s supremely geeky video-game scouting system, these Rockets don’t fit conventional wisdom. They’re 17-5 since Tracy McGrady limped off the court, and 15-5 since Rafer Alston was sent to Orlando. And now the question remains – will the addition-by-subtraction Rockets be able to see the Western Conference Semi-Finals for the first time since 1997? Read More »

Ever since I overheard Robin Lopez ask for a size medium t-shirt at the Dime/Levi’s Draft Suite, I’ve wanted to call out his manhood. Thankfully Shaq did that for me, albeit for a completely different reason. Before rehashing his speech to the media, O’Neal delivered something similar to this to Lopez in private. We don’t know what he and Lopez said behind closed doors, but here’s what he told the media. Read More »

Everybody in Chicago wants to coach Tyrus Thomas. While Vinny Del Negro and his staff are the ones actually getting paid to do it, Thomas has more volunteer advisors trying to get at him than Shaq‘s free-throw form, and only slightly less than Barack Obama. (And please believe that President Obama, a Bulls fan, has his own opinion on how Tyrus can get better.) Read More »

Rasual Butler got a wide open look from three to down the Kings coming out of a timeout. Somebody deserves to be blamed. Is it Francisco Garcia for not fighting through a screen and getting out on Butler? Is it Andres Nocioni for not switching to Butler quickly enough? Or is it Kenny Natt‘s fault for not making sure that his guys knew exactly what to do in this situation?