We’ve been talking about all the various ramifications of LeBron James‘ decision all summer. New home, new jersey, new shoe colorway. But one thing no one’s been talking about it his new signature. If you’ve ever seen LBJ’s signature since he’s come into the League (if not, see below) then you realize it started with a looping “L” (that resembled the start of his uniform No. 23) and went into his initials. But now, wearing No. 6 for the Heat, James had to change things up. Read More »

Whether it’s fantasy basketball or real life, everyone’s always trying to figure out who the biggest sleepers are heading into a new season. And while every NBA writer/prognosticator has their own views, it’s oftentimes interesting to hear the thoughts of NBA scouts as well. With that said, Sean Deveney of the Sporting News got up with some scouts to identify five players expected to have a breakout season this year. Here they are: Read More »

No complaints about Team USA’s Labor Day destruction of Angola: Scoring 121 points in a 40-minute game is about as perfect as you can get on offense, and more importantly moving forward in the World Championship bracket, Team USA didn’t take their foot off the pedal, holding Angola to just 10 points in the fourth quarter when the game had been long over … Chauncey Billups (19 pts, 5 threes) and Eric Gordon (17 pts, 5 threes) led the sniper brigade outside, and even Derrick Rose knocked down three triples. Read More »

Labor Day celebration: Barbecue, beer, pants-optional day of not having to do any work (well, for most of us) and … the Angolan national basketball team? It’s not the most TV-friendly matchup, but you’re gonna spend some of the holiday watching Team USA, it’s going to be against Charles Barkley‘s favorite pushovers at the World Championship … The U.S. did what they were supposed to do to handle their business and get a favorable matchup in the knockout round, but if you’re rooting for Coach K’s team, you still kind of wish they could get a tougher test before things get real serious … You know who really needs to step up today? Andre Iguodala. Read More »

NBA TV almost got it right. For the first day of knockout-round play at the FIBA World Championship, they realized the single-announcer thing wasn’t working. So they rolled out a pair of talking heads — only they still had The Worst Announcer In The History Of Basketball involved. Viewers of the Spain/Greece game were among the unfortunate victims. Again, the action itself was good, but you’d have been better off watching on MUTE. With six minutes left, Spain was up by one before Rudy Fernandez sparked a 9-0 run to stretch the lead to double-digits. Read More »

Everybody had the day off at the World Championship, as pool play is wrapped and we move to the knockout round. Today it’ll be Serbia vs. Croatia, and Spain vs. Greece in a matchup that is happening way earlier than anyone expected. After losing two games in pool play (to France and Lithuania), Spain can’t pretend like they haven’t gotten their wake-up call. Marc Gasol put up 25 points and 8 boards in what was basically a must-win against Lebanon, and is averaging 15.4 points and 7.2 boards in the tournament. Rudy Fernandez (shooting), J.C. Navarro (scoring) and Ricky Rubio (dishing) are doing their thing, and even Fran Vazquez showed up the other day (more than can be said about his Orlando Magic career). Read More »

In perhaps the biggest summer of free agent signings ever, there are still a bunch of guys on the outside looking in. If you’ve been following along with Dime’s 2010 NBA Free Agent Tracker, then you realize just who these guys are. But with September upon us, it’s either one more shot at the League or overseas for many of these guys. With that said, here’s an update on some guys who just got invited to training camp. Read More »

Earlier this week, Dime’s Andrew Macaluso wrote an opinion column — and I should stress the word opinion — about Deron Williams and the likelihood of him leaving Utah in 2012 for the Dallas Mavericks. The column drew a lot of attention across the country, especially in Utah, where the understandably defensive fan base mostly blasted Andrew for factual errors and various assumptions he made in his piece.

One such response came from Utah Jazz radio/TV personality David Locke, whom Andrew interviewed (via Twitter) and quoted in his column. In a blog post titled, “Reacting to Absurdity – The Dime Magazine Piece,” Locke blew off Andrew’s column as garbage and defended his own role in supporting Andrew’s conclusion that Deron won’t finish his career in Utah. Read More »

After he averaged 15.1 points and 10.6 rebounds in the month of April during his rookie season — as the youngest player in the League, mind you — I knew Anthony Randolph was going to be something special.

This is a kid who put up 15.8 points and 8.5 rebounds per game as a freshman at LSU before bolting to the NBA. After being selected with the 14th pick in the ’08 draft to run in Don Nelson‘s up-tempo offense — which should have been a blessing for the ultra-talented human highlight reel — Randolph started 22 games as a rookie and capped the season with averages of 7.9 points and 5.8 rebounds. Read More »

A week ago, we showed you the shoe that Brandon Jennings will be wearing this season: the Under Armour Micro G Black Ice. But in addition to that, Under Armour will also be releasing three other models as well: the Micro G Blur, Micro G Lite and Micro G Fly. Check out a picture of all four after the jump. Read More »