The second round of the playoffs is underway and with only eight teams remaining, it means another eight have been eliminated from title contention. The offseason is the time for these teams to retool to prepare for deeper runs next season. The Denver Nuggets finished the year with a franchise-best 57-25 record and were the third seed in the Western Conference. Boasting a 38-3 home record, many felt they would advance to the second round simply by winning all of their home games. Read More »

With the playoffs starting this weekend, we look to the only person whose opinion matters about each team’s playoff outlook: 2 Chainz. From the top-seeded Heat to the limping Lakers (sorry, Utah fans), we used the Tity Boi scriptures to find out how all 16 teams will perform this postseason. Read More »

If you made Carmelo Anthony into a Mortal Kombat character, he’d have it all. You could give him some knives, a couple of devastating 360 kicks, maybe even fire-breathing capabilities. But as all gamers know, no matter how nasty you are at putting characters on their asses, you still have to save your energy… can’t be in there button mashing. That’s the only thing New Yorkers are worried about right now. Read More »

If last night’s Thunder/Spurs game was a preview of the Western Conference Finals, we’d be more than ok with it. The Manu-less Spurs made the trip to OKC and fought valiantly, but still got a whole facefull of Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant buckets. The NBA’s top dynamic duo combined for 52 of the Thunder’s 100 total points in a 100-88 victory. Russ put in 27 (as well as seven boards and seven assists), despite playing 10 minutes less than KD (25, nine boards, six assists) … We’re not going to lie, after Durant dribbled through half the Spurs’ team and then hit San Antonio with a huge dunk, we 100% laughed out loud when TNT was going to commercial showing a replay and Reggie Miller yelled, “Mommmy has some things for daddy to do!” … Read More »

Fifteen-game winning streaks generally don’t end at the hands of names like Brian Roberts, Darius Miller, Ryan Anderson and Roger Mason. Then again, 15-game winning streaks generally don’t end in 24-point blowouts at the hands of a 25-win team, either … Read More »

No one, it seems, walks into Denver lately and comes out unscathed. The Nuggets are rolling past teams to the point if you go in on the back end of a back-to-back it’s almost an assumed loss and, welp, watch your head that you don’t get dunked on too badly. Read More »

Despite the convenience to call the post-All Star period the NBA’s second half, the playoffs are right around the corner. This is a sprint in the final two months with the Heat having to play the most games before the playoffs with 32 (the Lakers: 26). For Joe Johnson, what a better way to start it off than hitting the two biggest shots of the game. Read More »

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Does this headline seem a little familiar to you? A little déjà vu? It’s because less than two weeks ago George Karl called Andre Miller one of the best point guards of all time. He clarified the statement by saying he looked at Miller as a traditional lead guard, a player who did all the small things, never took stuff off the table and was always a team-first guy. Read More »

Before Ric Bucher left ESPN this fall, he tweeted one of the more interesting behind-the-scenes nuggets to take into consideration whenever Oklahoma City and the Lakers play. Bucher said that underneath the “We’re all friends!” vibe Team USA put out in winning gold in London last summer, Kobe Bryant was trying to create a wedge between Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant by telling Russ he deserved to be the team’s alpha male. The young OKC stars were wise to the Mamba’s plot then and apparently want to destroy L.A. each time they play the Lakers now because of what Kobe tried to do. Read More »