The big news over the weekend wasn’t about the lackluster slam dunk contest, the competitive All-Star game or the Shakira/Alicia Keys halftime show; it was about the huge deal between the Dallas Mavericks and the Washington Wizards. Caron Butler, Brendan Haywood and DeShawn Stevenson were sent to Dallas in exchange for Josh Howard, Drew Gooden, Quinton Ross and James Singleton. Let’s breakdown the fantasy ramifications. Read More »

With a day off in between the All-Star Game and the continuation of the NBA schedule, Monday was a time for trades, post-trade fallout, and trade rumors … As we wrote this column, the Blazers and Clippers were reportedly very close to closing a deal that would send Marcus Camby to Portland for Travis Outlaw and Steve Blake. The Blazers have to do something to cover the hole left at center by Greg Oden and Joel Przybilla’s injuries, because going into the playoffs with Juwan Howard starting in the middle is just asking for a first-round exit. Read More »

With the NBA All-Star Weekend around the corner, and the NBA Trade Deadline right after that, there’s definitely going to be some things happening in the League. With that in mind, check out five major story lines that the NBA will see heading into the All-Star Break… Read More »

The thematic stat you’re going to hear whenever the Mavericks get into another close game is that, dating back to last season, the Mavs are 10-0 in their last 10 games that were decided by one point. The Mavs are also 3-0 this season in games decided by two points, including last November when Dirk Nowitzki hit a game-winner in Milwaukee. Last night the Mavs hosted the Bucks, and again it went down to the wire … Read More »

LeBron James and Kevin Durant didn’t go head-to-head as much as you would have liked to see during Cavs/Thunder, but they did square off on the most important play of the game — and LeBron came out on top. OKC was up one in the final seconds of the fourth when LeBron got a rebound, pushed the ball upcourt and found Boobie Gibson open for the go-ahead triple. (Can you blame Boobie for constantly walking around with a goofy smile on his face? He gets paid to do one thing — shoot the ball — while perhaps the best player in the world does the hard work to make him famous, AND Boobie gets to go home to Keyshia Cole every night. That’s not even fair to the rest of us.) Read More »

When they weren’t busy complaining about the refs and conveniently turning their heads whenever the Celtics committed a foul, Boston announcers Tommy Heinsohn and Mike Gorman were actually pretty funny during last night’s Hawks/Celtics game when they turned their attention to slaughtering Jamal Crawford for his, um, less than stellar defense.

In the first half, Heinsohn pointed out that whoever Crawford was guarding was attacking the basket at will. “Well, they should,” Gorman quipped. In the second half, Heinsohn said, “[Crawford] couldn’t guard anything if you gave him a rifle and put him outside Buckingham Palace.” Read More »

One of the better dunks of the season came from the most unlikely source. Last night, 36-year-old forward, Juwan Howard surprised everyone (especially Chris Kaman) with this monster cram during the second quarter in a game against the Clippers last night. Honestly, I don’t remember Juwan dunking that hard, even when he was at Michigan.

For Chris Paul and Deron Williams to go head-to-head and put up underwhelming numbers isn’t a surprise anymore. For Devin Brown — the rare NBA starter who could also appear on “Who He Play For?” and stump Charles Barkley — to steal the show from both of those guys is definitely a surprise … Brown (30 pts, 5 threes) got it rolling early, scoring 10 of N.O.’s first 18 points, wetting jumpers and getting layups in transition off Utah turnovers. Despite Brown’s hot start, however, the Hornets struggled overall, falling behind by double-digits in a first quarter highlighted by C.J. Miles‘ 360 two-hand dunk. Read More »

Working at Dime Magazine, a ton of headlines, news and opinions pass through our website each week. Everyday a new story breaks and we change our focus to the next game on the schedule. Before this week gets started, I’ll take the time to reflect on what the NBA taught me last week. Read More »

Everybody had the day off on Christmas Eve, with no pro or college hoops on the schedule. So if you weren’t into watching SMU beat the brakes off Nevada in the Hawaii Bowl, or that 7th-8th-9th replay of Home Alone, it was just sitting and waiting for today’s all-national TV slate. Consider this a user’s guide on what to watch for Christmas Day …

Heat at Knicks (12 p.m. EST, ESPN). D-Wade’s history with New York is up-and-down: He dropped 55 on ‘em last year, but also got 52 dropped on him at MSG by Jamal Crawford a couple years back. Read More »