It turns out that Playboy Mansion rehabilitation isn’t a bad idea after all. Andrew Bynum came back from a 32-game hiatus, some of which was spent with a playmate on his shoulders, looking like he’d been spending his time training down at USC with Pete Carroll. It wasn’t just the Matt Leinart knee brace – it was that Bynum seemed even stronger than he was before his knee gave way. Read More »

Take a look at Nike’s newest creation, the Nike Hypermax. Read More »

If you haven’t heard yet, Nike is offering iD services for Hyperdunks. To go with the launch, they’ve dropped new TV spots, including this one with Coach K. Good stuff …

We hit you with the NCAA Tournament Hyperdunks yesterday, now we wanted to follow up with the new uniform designs Nike schools will be rocking in the Dance.

Duke, Gonzaga, Memphis, Michigan State and Oregon will be outfitted head to toe in Nike Pro Combat gear and their unis will feature brand new designs. (see them after the jump) Read More »

I’m currently in the lobby of the downtown Phoenix Sheraton, watching somebody excitedly get their picture taken with Gheorge Muresan while My Giant was trying to check into his room. Rookie/Sophomore practice ended a little bit ago, and we’re now a couple minutes away from the All-Star Saturday Night and All-Star Game media sessions … Imagine lazily shooting around with your boys at the gym — and I mean “lazily” to the extent that no one is jumping when they take jump shots — with a coach trying to teach the principles of pick-and-roll defense on deaf ears, and you get the idea of how these “practices” go. Luis Scola looked like he’d just gotten out of bed 15 minutes beforehand … A number of guys on the Sophomore team had some pretty ill purple/orange/white Huaraches, including Thad Young, Aaron Brooks (206!) and Al Thornton. Although when I asked Al about his kicks, he referred to them as Hyperdunks. Read More »

Anyone who saw what Jerryd Bayless did in the ‘08 NBA Vegas Summer League — or who saw him regularly slip into that D-Wade mode at Arizona — knew he had last night’s performance in him. Finally getting some decent tick thanks to Steve Blake’s shoulder injury, Bayless dropped 23 points off the bench (6-9 FG, 11-11 FT), using that lethal first step to get into the lane and create contact, and the threat of a deep jumper just enough to keep the defense honest. Early in the fourth quarter Bayless scored to bring Portland within one point, then on the next possession got a scoop shot and-one to put them ahead. Hanging onto a lead with three minutes left, Bayless went baseline and two-hand crammed on Bobby Simmons plus-one for what was essentially the dagger … Bayless’ only major misstep was on defense, when Devin Harris (23 pts, 8 asts) gave him a step-back move and almost made him do the splits … Where would Portland be without Joel Przybilla? On another one of Greg Oden’s “He’ll be fine, they just need to have him focus on defense and rebounding” nights (2 pts, 13 mins), Przybilla once again came off the bench and held it down. Read More »

Since you guys didn’t care for my top 10 sneaker list too much, maybe you’ll respect Bun B’s. One half of the legendary group UGK (R.I.P. Pimp C), Bun B. is respected in the sneaker community. Read More »

After Pau Gasol scored his seventh point in the final three minutes of the Lakers/Celtics Finals rematch last night, you could almost see steam pouring out from his ears, as the six-month wait for revenge had finally been realized. Pau was the one who broke Boston’s back, as the C’s gameplan clearly indicated that they weren’t going to let Kobe get after their jugular. But ultimately, Mamba (27 points, 9 reb’s, 5 ast’s) diced the consistent double-teams by spotting Pau over and over again standing free at the stripe. If they didn’t sick the dogs on Kobe, it would have been one of those crunch time performances for him. He already had the diabolical look at times – it was more American Psycho than Tony Montana – the best example being the shot he took in the second half, following two dribbles directly at the baseline, Bryant elevated and squared up mid-air in the same motion before whapping a 20-footer. But it’s amazing how quickly he can flip that switch from bloodthirsty to Barney. You gotta love Kobe in his interviews with Lisa Salters – during the half and after the game – when he kept telling Lisa about how much “fun” he was having out there. Come on Kob, you’re not fooling anyone. Read More »

The 2009 NBA All-Star game isn’t that far away. Every year I look forward to seeing the All-Star player make ups that the guys wear. Read More »

We’re at MSG this afternoon, where the Jazz are trying to remain one of the League’s three remaining unbeatens through a five-game Eastern Conference swing. Before game time, usually some guys are on the court shooting jumpers or stretching, but these guys seem to do everything together. Even if they’re separated into a bunch of cliques, the Jazz genuinely like each other. Virtually the entire squad was in the locker room for the majority of the 90 minutes leading up to tip-off.

Ronnie Price, Ronnie Brewer, Paul Millsap, and C.J. Miles – who all wear the same black Hyperdunks – were holding down one corner, while the foreign contingent of Andrei Kirilenko and Kyrylo Fesenko joked around in another one. Carlos Boozer was relaxing by himself, bumping music in his headphones loud enough to make someone standing next to him deaf. Dude loves DJ Khaled. Read More »