I can’t resist season preview magazines. NBA, NFL, college, MLB, I’m a sucker for those thick annual issues that I’ll pore through in a couple of sittings before the season, then rarely open during the season. (Speaking of, keep an eye out for Dime #53, our NBA/college/high school preview issue.)

Every few years, one of the preview mags will do a feature where they create the “perfect” player for their sport, Dr. Frankenstein-style. Read More »

Allen Iverson made last night’s Grizzlies/Kings game worth checking out from the beginning, but Kevin Martin made it worth staying until the end. What was originally billed as A.I.’s big debut turned into K-Mart’s showcase, it may have been the best game of the season so far, and it was a hell of a timely ad for NBA League Pass as the free preview week wraps up … Checking in to a nice ovation from the Sacramento crowd, Iverson looked like he was just testing out his hamstring in his initial rotation, a scoreless five-minute stretch of the first quarter. Read More »

I don’t really do fantasy basketball. Between watching a handful of NBA games every night, playing my own video-game season on NBA 2K, and trying to fit a healthy amount of college and a little bit of high school hoops into the mix, fantasy is a little more than I can handle. But I do like putting together custom lineups just as much as the next fan, hence the Create-Your-Team feature from one year ago. Time for Round Two. Read More »

By now, you should know that when NBA announcers keep saying, “Kobe is really frustrated,” it’s actually code for, “Kobe’s shot isn’t falling and he’s battling with the refs.” … That was the case during Lakers/Mavericks last night, as L.A. got smoked on its homecourt and Kobe (20 pts, 6-19 FG) struggled between breaking out his best whiny faces. Read More »

Every NBA season begins with a bloated numbers of players dreaming All-Star dreams. Over the summer and in the preseason, you hear guys with All-Star talent promising this will be the year they break through, or guys who are barely impact players vowing to make the leap to All-Star status. Or more often than not, it’s a coach or a teammate who runs the campaign for them. Either way, each October there’s 50 “potential” All-Stars, some of whom won’t even be mentioned in the All-Star discussion come January, and some who will fall just a bit short. Who’s on that list this year? Read More »

For a franchise that supposedly doesn’t have any money, the Grizzlies went all-out for their home opener. After introducing the Pistons to the theme from Beverly Hills Cop (cute), the Jumbotron showed a dramatic over-the-top video where Allen Iverson and Rudy Gay talked about “Grizz Nation” and defending homecourt. Then the DJ put on a Michael Myers/Halloween-inspired track, and the Jabbawockeez appeared at midcourt to dance. THEN they brought out Three Six Mafia, wearing Memphis jerseys and performing “Stay Fly” to bleed into the player intros, complete with smoke machines and everything else. Read More »

Last year we debuted the “Highs and Lows” system — previewing the NBA season by predicting the respective ceiling and basement for each team. Same theme, different season…

Added: Blake Griffin, Rasual Butler, Sebastian Telfair, Craig Smith, Kareem Rush

Lost: Zach Randolph, Mike Taylor, Fred Jones, Paul Davis Read More »

These days, the business of basketball is good for the Portland Trail Blazers. However, not too long ago, the City of Roses tagged their only pro sports team by another name: the Jail Blazers.

The era of the Jail Blazers is an interesting and lengthy time period, through which it extends from J.R. Rider’s heyday, until really 2005. Whereas, the Blazers had been branded with this label for a while, I chose to further examine Burnside’s best from ’01 through the ’04 season. Read More »

Imagine the disappointment that swept across the NBA TV studios when they found out LeBron was sick and going to miss last night’s big preseason game between the Cavs and Wizards. No tense ‘Bron/DeShawn encounters, no real reason for highlight montages of LBJ taking Washington’s heart in the playoffs, no smooth segues to talk about Mike Miller wearing LeBron’s signature shoes. And to top it off, starting in LBJ’s place was Jawad Williams, who scored 21 points (4 threes) in his last Smack mention of the season, a Cleveland loss … Gilbert Arenas put up 18 points for the Wiz, while Miller scored 24 (5 threes) and Randy Foye scored 21. However, Antawn Jamison hurt his shoulder in the first quarter and didn’t return. Read More »

Last year we debuted the “Highs and Lows” system — previewing the upcoming NBA season by predicting the respective ceilings and basements for each team. Same theme, different season…

Added: Allen Iverson, Zach Randolph, Hasheem Thabeet, DeMarre Carroll, Sam Young, Mike Taylor, Marcus Williams Read More »