You don’t need me to point out that tonight is the biggest game of the season. Massive. Enormous. Undertaker-huge. Rings are resting on these 48 minutes. The winners of Game 5s in the Finals win the series 77% of the time. If Miami wins, wrap it up. If Dallas wins, they have a death grip on it.

Because of the 2-3-2 format, Game 5s always seem to carry some type of legendary stench. The air is stuffy with expectations and formality. Just look at tonight, at all of the storylines. Read More »

With the sudden retirement of Shaquille O’Neal from the NBA, we got to thinking about all the great players that the Big Social Security Applier played with during his 19 seasons in the league. There’s a long list of All-Stars, but in making the list, we ask this question: Who was at their best while playing with Shaq? For example, the Kevin Garnett that O’Neal played with this season won’t rank as highly as the 2007-08 Amar’e Stoudemire that he shared the court with in his Phoenix stint.

Obviously, we’ll save all the center slots for the Big Aristotle himself, but without further adieu, we present the First, Second and Third All-Shaq teams: Read More »

The rainy day here in NYC has us talking in the office about the best NBA three-point shooters of all-time. And while the conversation started on Twitter, we wanted to bring it to the faithful at DimeMag.com as well. So if you needed one triple, and had any NBA player at your disposal, who do you go with? Read More »

Last night, NBA fans were given something we’ve never seen before. No, not just LeBron James‘ widely-criticized but highly-viewed “The Decision” TV special, but we saw an unprecedented collection of three superstar teammates form like the Justice League … Think about all the other “Big Three” combos: Bird, McHale and Parish were nowhere near as athletic as Dwyane Wade, LeBron James and Chris Bosh. Jordan, Pippen and Rodman were a different bunch, consisting of one explosive scorer, one Swiss Army Knife in the flesh, and one defensive/rebounding savant. Read More »

Later on tonight, 60 ballplayers will live out a dream moment, while at least 60 more will feel the sting of getting pretty close to the dream but falling short. (Before re-focusing on making it the hard way.) That would be the NBA Draft, and as we get closer to the festivities at Madison Square Garden, the trade rumors and high-stock/low-stock speculation is running rampant … For the longest time it seemed the Nets were clearly taking either Derrick Favors or DeMarcus Cousins at No. 3, but yesterday Wes Johnson suddenly entered the picture: On one hand because he’s been killing in workouts, and because there may be a little handshake deal in place where if the Nets take Johnson, his agent will deliver them Carlos Boozer in free agency. Read More »

While I missed the majority of Lakers/Celtics Game 6 for my cousin’s high school graduation, everyone I know who watched the game had to come up with something to talk about during L.A.’s cold-blooded beatdown.

During the third quarter, one of my boys texted me: “Best role player ever in the NBA? Pippen?”

Depends on how you define a role player. To me, Scottie Pippen doesn’t count because he was too good. Read More »

The thing about Robert Horry that a lot of people didn’t appreciate: He wasn’t just knocking down one huge shot here or there at random intervals, he could take over an entire fourth quarter of a game by hitting multiple huge shots. As the 2010 version of Big Shot Rob, Derek Fisher reached that next level during the Lakers win over the Celtics in last night’s Game 3 of the NBA Finals … Kobe dominated the majority of a disjointed, ugly game that would have driven some basketball purists to hit the Crown Royal pretty hard, but for the first 10 minutes of the fourth quarter, Kobe couldn’t make a shot. That’s when Fisher (15 pts) took over, scoring 11 in the quarter on a series of fullback-style drives and last-ditch jumpers to beat the shot clock. Read More »

If you can’t teach height, then you can’t coach height, and so in that case you can see why the Celtics are in trouble. Remember how every Lakers fan claimed the ’08 Finals would have gone their way had Andrew Bynum been healthy, and every Boston fan responded by asking how their ass tastes? Last night we all saw what happens when L.A.’s big men are healthy and playing like they have some hair on their chests, before Kobe came in and delivered the fatal shots … Right off the bat L.A. looked to go inside, while Kobe looked to drive and put pressure on Boston’s defense. Read More »

The Suns vs. Spurs is one of the most underrated rivalries in sports, and it even flies under the radar as an NBA rivalry. It seems that every year now we have a Spurs vs. Suns bloodbath to look forward to, although under different circumstances each time. Read More »

Watching “SportsCenter” run their Top 10 NBA plays of the decade the other night — where the top three coincidentally involved LeBron and Kobe directly — I officially ran out of patience for this “decade” stuff. I know it seems fitting to have the best plays of the decade topped by (depending on who you ask) the best player of the decade, but was Kobe’s game-winner against the Suns in ’06 really the best play of the last TEN years? (I would have put Derek Fisher‘s 0.4 shot ahead of Kobe’s shot.)

So I have just one more piece to add to the decade celebration, then I’m done. Read More »