White Chocolate signing with the Magic yesterday likely signaled the last offseason move by any of the NBA’s legit championship contenders before training camp. (Assuming the Marquis Daniels-to-Boston deal is just a paperwork formality at this point.) So now that we know who’s working with what, why not start handicapping the field? … Orlando could very well run through the Eastern Conference postseason bracket again, but they probably won’t be doing it as a #1 or even a #2 seed thanks to Rashard Lewis‘ 10-game suspension. Read More »

Seeing as LeBron has given 15,000 “I’m cool where I’m at/I love Cleveland” interviews and yet you’ve still got dudes in New York City hawking homemade LBJ #23 Knicks jerseys on the street, there’s really no point in superstar free-agents-to-be saying anything about their situation in the months before they hit the market. Especially when they have a chance to sign a contract extension and don’t do it. Dwyane Wade probably gave Miami fans a lift with some recent quotes in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel: “Next year will be a big year for myself and for the team, but the plan has always been to stay with the Heat, and that’s still the plan,” Wade said. Read More »

Nothing happened in basketball yesterday. Really. The Celtics are still trying to find a way to make that sign-and-trade for Marquis Daniels work (a.k.a. ringing Chris Wallace’s phone off the hook), the Hawks are looking to add another big man (those auditioning for the role include Joe Smith, Jason Collins, Stromile Swift and D-League MVP Courtney Sims), and Linzas Kleiza is getting closer and closer to signing with Olympiakos (Greece) and making it official that the Nuggets really lost ground on the whole improving-the-team thing this summer. Other than that, most of the weekend was dead basketball-wise, with the first NFL preseason game, the Pro Football Hall of Fame, a Yankees/Red Sox series, and Tiger Woods involved in the last day of a tournament owning the headlines … Read More »

Thursday’s NBA news wire looked like the brainstorm meeting for an after-school special. First, with the promotion for LeBron James‘ quasi-autobiography (Shooting Stars, co-written with Buzz Bissinger of Friday Night Lights fame) underway, the big bombshell — and perfect cover-up for the Jordan Crawford thing — was ‘Bron Clinton revealing he smoked weed once in high school. In a book that mostly focuses on his high school career, LBJ also wrote about dealing with fame at a young age. “We had become big-headed jerks, me in particular,” James said. “And we are to blame for that, but so are adults who treated us that way and then sat back and smugly watched the self-destruction.” … Read More »

Like you needed another reason to hate on Kobe. Forbes unveiled its list of the world’s highest-paid athletes in 2009, and Kobe is near the top, along with a few other NBA players. Combining salary and endorsements, here are the notables:

* Tiger Woods is #1 with approximately $110 million in earnings in the last year. (And consider that Tiger missed a lot of opportunities at tournament prize money due to his knee injury.) Read More »

Friday was pretty quiet for the day after the opening act of the NBA Finals. Then again, funerals tend to be that way. Seriously though, only the most giddy Lakers fans (that includes you, Spike Lee) are completely writing off the Magic after the Game 1 piecing, but anyone who saw the game or just saw the score has to admit Orlando has a lot of work to do to make this series competitive. Read More »

If there was a defining sound from Game 1 of the Cavs/Magic series, it was the crash of the shot clock hitting the basket support after Dwight Howard’s dunk wrecked Cleveland’s gym. In Game 2, it was the roar of the crowd after LeBron’s game-winner. What was the defining sound of last night’s Game 3 in Orlando? A whistle. Clearly not interested in that old saying, “Nobody pays to see the refs,” Joey Crawford’s crew sent both teams to the foul line 86 times — with LeBron (18-24 FT) and Dwight (14-19 FT) practically living there — and issued two technicals and one flagrant foul. Read More »

Unfortunately for Birdman Andersen, there is no comeback player of the year award doled out in the NBA anymore. But if there was, he’d probably be the front-runner right now. This sequence from Denver’s win over the Mavericks on Friday night is the embodiment of his season - three rejections despite being elbowed in the stomach/ribs after the first one.
Read More »