Karl Malone was reliability personified in 18 seasons in Utah. He played in 1,353 games out of a possible 1,362, became the NBA’s second-leading scorer and one of its institutions with running mate John Stockton.

He’s no less reliable in retirement — as a thorn in the side of Jazz executives. The current CEO of the franchise, Greg Miller, took to Twitter this weekend to dispel Malone’s claim he had to scalp tickets to get in a recent game because none was made available to him by the club. A day later, Miller wrote an extensive personal blog post about his learning process with dealing with Malone. Namely, “I’ve tried to keep in mind the words of one of my mentors close to the situation who said “Karl Malone is a giant pain in the ass, but he’s our pain in the ass.” Read More »

“He’s incredible. The Broncos gave him NO shot! They don’t believe in him. John Fox and John Elway are secretly hoping he screws up so they can point their noses up at fans and say ‘I told you so!’ Tim Tebow has the clutch gene. This kid is special.”

Forgive me for getting my Skip Tebow on for just a second but I had to vent. Tim Tebow may not be a great player in the historical sense of the word – we don’t even really need to argue whether he can pass well enough to make it longterm or if he’s simply a fad. Tebow has become the story of the NFL season because he’s done the incredible. He turned a weak Denver team in a probable playoff and division-winning group that has so much confidence trailing in the fourth quarter that teams should probably start thinking about letting them take leads. Read More »

We’ve been waiting on an upset. Naturally this early in the season, you don’t expect it. Everyone is playing cupcakes, and conference schedules haven’t started yet. But where are the close games? Outside of a few, the majority so far have been snoozers. But last night, Pittsburgh got beat up from start to finish, in their own home… by freakin’ Long Beach State, 86-76. Miraculously, this was just the second time any non-Big East team had ever won in that building, and the 49ers didn’t just win. They dominated from the tip. Pitt was never closer than six throughout the whole second half despite some good games from Ashton Gibbs (20 points) and Nasir Robinson (19 points). Pitt did what they could to stay close, but check out the box score. Those Long Beach St. shooting percentages are video game-like. Read More »

For everyone out there calling for Pau Gasol‘s head, saying he fell off and was embarrassing in the playoffs and that the Lakers need to trade him to have a shot at another title, he has a few words for you: “Thanks for the trust.” The big Spaniard says he hasn’t paid attention to any negativity this summer and that one of the best parts of life is being able to go forward and prove people wrong. Looking back at last season, it was a tale of two lives for Gasol. For the first half of the year, he was phenomenal, probably even better than Kobe. He had a legitimate MVP case and was playing as well as he ever has. Read More »

When I had a chance to preview NBA 2K12 this week, I honestly came in ready for a let down. NBA 2K11 was out of this world, plain and simple. Without question the best sports game of the year, and arguably the best video game of the year. But even though the hype for 2012 was there, I wasn’t quite buying into it. Oh, how I was wrong. Read More »

Basketball legend and mustache aficionado Karl Malone recently embarked on a USO tour of the Middle East to meet with soldiers and lend his support. At a dinner in Afghanistan with members of the Alabama National Guard, The Mailman sat next to Dime reader Tim Pierce, who is also my kid brother. Read More »

The league starts and finishes another day of the dreaded lockout today, which saw a glimmer of hope as the NFL rebooted up to normal. However, just like last week, our foreign friends are continuing to try to lure superstars onto courts far away from home. Amar’e Stoudemire is the newest big-time attraction on the overseas market. The Knickerbocker big man’s phone is attracting calls from all sorts of places, including Israel, Turkey, China and Spain. Read More »

Two of the greatest power forwards who ever lived. Two of the best 20-25 players of all-time. Two franchise enforcers who never won rings. Two complete opposites, one an out-going, comedian who’s perhaps become more famous since his retirement. The other, a farm boy from Louisiana who dropped out of the limelight the minute he said goodbye to the NBA. Karl Malone and Charles Barkley carried the power forward torch for nearly two decades (two decades that also happened to hold the best collection of big-men talent the game has ever seen). Read More »

As the NBA lockout lingers on like a bad hangover or the movie “Gigli,” we here at Dime have decided to go on a field trip. We’re hopping in the time machine and going back to 1998, the year of the last NBA lockout. A little “then and now” if you will; who were the best players in the league then, and what are they doing now.

But let’s make this a little more interesting…since we’re back there, we might as well see what the top players in today’s game were up to in 1998. Read More »

This title run was for all the skeptics, all the haters.

Suddenly, Dirk’s playoff career looks pretty good (despite the fact that he was in the middle of one of the worst choke jobs ever seen in the ’06 Finals). His career postseason numbers are still standing in that ultra-elusive 25/10 club (25.9 & 10.4) and in the ridiculous Western Conference – there were a few years where you had to win 50 games JUST TO GET in the playoffs – Dirk has led Dallas to the playoffs in 11 consecutive seasons as the unquestioned alpha dog on his team. Read More »