Whether you hate the WNBA, you love it, or you can simply appreciate what it brings to the basketball landscape, no true ballplayer likes to see a group of their own suddenly out of a job, or a loyal fan base left without a team.

The WNBA’s Sacramento Monarchs folded today. The Monarchs were one of the W’s original eight franchises, winning a league championship in 2005 and losing in the WNBA Finals in 2006. Read More »

Ever since he entered the league in 2004, Josh Smith has been treating the basketball world with highlight reel dunks on a nightly basis. While he still gets above the rim routinely, J-Smooth has also developed an all-around game. He has become one of the league’s all-around threats averaging 16 ppg, 7.3 rpg, 4.4 apg, 2.6 bpg, 1.6 spg, while shooting 58.9 percent from the field. We caught up with Smith before the Hawks dismantled the Knicks 114-101 last night. Read More »

The Utah Jazz locker room is a lot more interesting than you think. Although he gives terrible interviews, Deron Williams has no problem running his mouth to C.J. Miles and Ronnie Brewer. Rookie Eric Maynor is getting teased by every media member in the Madison Square Garden locker room for his hot pink Barbie backpack (I’m guessing it’s not by choice). Meanwhile, Carlos Boozer is on his own island sitting in front of the TV watching game film while bobbing his head to his headphones (which are playing Jay-Z’s “Public Service Announcement”). In the midst of the chaos, Andrei Kirilenko is sitting quietly by himself reading a book and looking sophisticated with his new Jude Law haircut and his legs crossed. I felt bad interrupting him, but did so anyway to get this interview. Read More »

Beast of the Night: Chris Paul edges out Kobe Bryant, Dwyane Wade and David Lee with his 39 points, 5 rebounds, 7 assists and 2 steals, along with 61 percent (14-23) shooting from the floor and perfect (8-8) shooting from the line. He also hit 3 treys in an overtime victory over Dallas. CP3 got off to a relatively slow start this season but has really turned it on for the past three games. He’s playing with some extra ferocity nowadays and that’s a great thing for his fantasy owners. Read More »

Today, after 19-years as a TV commentator for NBA games, Bill Walton officially announced his retirement from broadcasting. The Big Red cited back problems as the reason why he is stepping back from his play-by-play with ESPN/ABC. Read More »

“Soprano the rock, handle like Van Exel” – Jay-Z

There was a reason why Hova would name drop Nick Van Exel’s name in a verse. Nick the Quick was everything you wanted out of a small guard: a smooth south paw stroke, crafty dribble moves, great court vision and money in the clutch. And best of all, everything he did, he did it with style. Read More »

Right after “Take advantage of any opportunity for free food,” one of the golden rules of this whole journalism thing is that you have to let both sides tell their story.

Over the last year, a lot of people have been telling Rip Hamilton’s story for him. Read More »

Last year we debuted the “Highs and Lows” system — previewing the NBA season by predicting the respective ceiling and basement for each team. Same theme, different season…

Added: Jonny Flynn, Ramon Sessions, Wayne Ellington, Ryan Hollins, Damien Wilkins, Sasha Pavlovic, Antonio Daniels, Oleksiy Pecherov, Jason Hart, Nathan Jawai, Mark Blount, Henk Norel

Lost: Randy Foye, Mike Miller, Sebastian Telfair, Craig Smith, Rodney Carney, Mark Madsen, Kevin Ollie, Jason Collins, Shelden Williams, Bobby Brown Read More »

There’s no question that the class of 2008 is front-loaded with talent. And now that the rookie jitters are gone and contract extensions are in sight, how will they fare after a year in the League under their belts? The reality is, a case can be made for almost 30 guys to be on this list in some way. For instance, where do Danilo Gallinari and Roy Hibbert go with such strong coach-backing? It’s still too early to close the book on any of these guys, but so far here are my predictions. Read More »

We’ve all heard of NBA players trying to rap or sing, but it isn’t too often you hear about players trying to be DJs. Former NBA player Rony Seikaly is supposedly legit on the ones and twos. The 6-11 center from Lebanon played 11 seasons (1987-’99) in the league, where he had respectable career averages of 14.9 points, 9.5 rebounds and 1.3 blocks per game. He spent the majority of his career with Miami, where he was on the roster for the franchise’s inaugural season. Read More »