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 »

Forget Steve Nash and Baron Davis. Jeremy Lin is taking over NYC. The Knicks survived New Jersey 99-92, and it was their popular bench warmer who had the city juiced. Deron Williams (21 points, 11 assists), the former best point guard in the world, was getting worked over by Lin (25 points, five rebounds, seven assists) down the stretch. Jumpers. Pick-n-rolls Everything was out of wack for New York. Carmelo (3-for-15) couldn’t make a shot, and Amar’e Stoudemire wasn’t much better, but Lin was pulling out reverses, and after a three-point play, Tyson Chandler was doing the Brandy Reed celebration from back in the day … Read More »

There’s no grander stage than Madison Square Garden, and Derrick Rose shined like stars should in NYC as Chicago bounced the Knicks, 105-102. The basics first: 32 points, 13 assists. What left you gasping: a blow-by Toney Douglas dunk in the third, a deke of Tyson Chandler at the rim a little later. The capper, however, was a layup where he avoided Chandler, Amar’e Stoudemire and Jared Jeffries driving through the lane while playing hide-and-seek with the ball around his head. Read More »

Do you believe in Philly now? You should. The 76ers turned the stove temperature up in the third quarter and started grilling Chicago. It was like the visitors got caught up in a storm they couldn’t get out of. The defense was suffocating. Andre Iguodala (19 points) had a cuff dunk that only five or six people in the world could’ve pulled off. And Jrue Holiday (17 points) capped it all with a corner three right before the quarter ended. 26 to 11, they mauled the second-best team in the East in the third, and ended up winning 98-82. Read More »

Ranking the NBA from worst to first…

30. Charlotte Bobcats (3-19) Last Week: 29, -1 The worst team in the league. Bar none. Nine straight losses. Their only bright spot in all of this is Kemba Walker. In his last five games, he’s averaging 15.2 points, seven rebounds and five assists a game and had the first triple-double in his rookie class. Your turn, Ricky and Kyrie. Read More »

Nowadays it’s common knowledge that C.J. Miles is one of the NBA’s biggest sneakerheads. (If you don’t believe me, WATCH THIS.) And while his collection runs deep with stuff you might be able to get your hands on, he’s also been known to dabble a bit with NIKEiD. With that, check out two versions of the Nike Zoom KD III iD he designed for the court in Jazz colors. Read More »

I’m pretty sure the title explains everything you need to know. Read More »

Nothing hurts more than losing your spot at the gym because you lost to a bunch of random dudes. That’s what happened to the Lakers last night in Milwaukee. With Stephen Jackson corporate thuggin’ it off-court (suspended for verbal abuse of an official), Andrew Bogut out with his yearly injury and Brandon Jennings playing more passively than at any point over the past month, the Lakers took body blows from Drew Gooden, Mike Dunleavy and Ersan Ilyasova before finally falling 100-89. Read More »

Ranking the NBA from worst to first …

30. New Orleans Hornets (3-15) Last Week: 25, -5 Since they started off the year 2-0, the Hornets have lost more than just their sting. They’re 1-15 since and haven’t sniffed an ounce of winning. One thing you can say about them is they fight. Their last nine losses have all been by 10 or less against teams sporting a .606 winning percentage. Read More »

Lob City’s a Laker town again, if only for a night in this upside-down season where the Clippers are the supposed juggernaut in town. With Andy Garcia looking on with an, ahem, obvious Lakers’ interest, Metta World Peace was as much a factor tonight as he hasn’t been the rest of the season. His physicality and hesitation three, his only bucket of the night, with 3:30 left capped an 11-4 run and the Lakers put the game away from there, thanks to two key plays from Andrew Bynum (19 points). In the closing seconds, he caught a lob from Kobe and finished, and then snuffed DeAndre Jordan‘s layup. Was this truly the night the big kid finally grew up? Read More »