We’ll call this the list Gary McGhee loves to hate…

I’ve been on both sides of the coin before. It’s the embarrassing times you remember. One in particular stands out for me. College. Sophomore year. Preseason. Every fall semester at a D-III college is always the same: there are the returning players and then there are dozens of kids from high school, all coming together and all believing they’ll be one of the three or four kids who actually make the team. They all have some game and they’re all cocky. Read More »

Jalen Rose is the last relevant member of the Fab Five, parlaying his NBA career into an ESPN NBA analyst job and Grantland podcaster. Well, apparently Jalen doesn’t consider himself a part of the everyday media machine, even though he’s a part of the 30-second attention-grabbing proclamations that berate us through the television day in and day out. In a recent radio appearance, Rose took the opportunity to reproach the recently nicknamed “Fab Five” U.S. women’s gymnastics team under the guise of laziness, even if this was only a veiled defense of his own unique distinction as one of Michigan basketball’s five fabulous freshmen. Here’s what Jalen had to say: Read More »

These NBA Finals have twisted the narrative and archetypes we thought we knew going in like a double helix. We thought the notions of what the Miami Heat and Oklahoma City Thunder are were entangled deeply within them just like a strand of DNA. The pressure-cooker of these Finals has changed those so far. Miami has a 2-1 lead after the 91-85 win Sunday night at home, the first of its three there. Dwyane Wade (25 points, 7 and 7), Chris Bosh (10 points, 11 boards) and LeBron James (29 points, 14 boards) combined to score the final 15 points for Miami, which brought this thing back from the brink of a nine-point deficit. Read More »

Indiana gave the Heat enough chances, missing more freebies than a Ben Wallace practice session, and yet the two best players in the world (supposedly) couldn’t finish the job. At home. With mismatches all over the court. The Pacers worked off a terrible first half to tie the series up with their 78-75 Game 2 win, which didn’t become official until Miami let Mario Chalmers seal their fate in the closing seconds (this ain’t college). Down three, South Beach’s starting point guard and LeBron‘s personal whipping boy decided it was his time, and lofted up a triple that was too ugly to have a chance. Read More »

Bump this at your neighborhood barbecue this weekend. Steve Francis recently released a music video for his “Finer Things” track, and we mentioned it in Smack, but doesn’t he sound an awful lot like Ja Rule? Read More »

Normally, we’d start a 13-game night off with some recaps, but since the average margin of victory across the NBA last night was like 87 points, it felt good just to look forward to the weekend. The regular season is over and the matchups are set. In the West, it’ll be San Antonio and Utah, OKC against Dallas, the Lakers taking on Denver and then Memphis hosting the Clippers. The East looks pretty good as well: Chicago takes on Philly, Miami and New York do battle, Indiana will host whatever’s left of the Magic, and even though they’re the No. 4 seed, Boston will open the playoffs in the ATL. Read More »

It is pretty rare when an elite superstar, a player at the top of their game, is traded off by a team. Circumstances have to reach a boiling point where the team is not going anywhere or the player sees greener pastures and nothing will stop that fixation. In the NBA today, superstars (and those who think they are superstars) are all built the same. If their team has not won a championship or when they see their friends winning them in a brief amount of time, they see it as a need for a new setting. Read More »

Dwight Howard hears your concerns, especially you Magic fans out there. He appreciates the Stay Dwight campaign, and doesn’t seem like he really wants to leave. It’s as if he’s slowly being pulled away towards the big city – L.A. or New York. He wants to show he cares. So come Nov. 13, he’ll be throwing his own charity game, which has so many former or current Magic players, we might as well just call it a preseason scrimmage. Everyone from DeShawn Stevenson to Ryan Anderson will be in the house, but the one guy I want to see – no, must see – is Steve Francis. Stevie Franchise… or whatever’s left of him. Read More »

Did the Heat lose in the Finals last year because LeBron played like he was scared? Did they lose because J.J. Barea went off? Did they lose because Dirk did everything outside of morphing into Larry Bird to stop them? Dwyane Wade doesn’t believe any of that was the real reason they lost. The Heat lost because of misplaced emotion. Wade and his teammates wanted to win to spite people because so much of the public actively hated them. Public Enemy No. 1. Even Ice Cube in his heyday never felt this hated. And yet Wade told Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski on his radio show that the team was wrongly fueled by hate, and didn’t win the championship because of that. Do you buy it? Read More »

Honestly, there are few things that feel better than dribbling a basketball. Very few…and those are all outside of basketball. It seems natural: Basketball in hand. The basketball pounding against the gym floor. The sneakers squeaking. On the court, it’s art. Dribble low. Dribble high. Fast. Quick. I know it sounds corny, but for me it’s true. I could be in the gym for hours, and do nothing but push the rock through drills. Read More »