At this point, it appears that it’s not if, but rather when, Monta Ellis will be traded from the Warriors. With his agent, Jeff Fried, scheduled to meet with team management in Oakland tomorrow, apparently at Don Nelson’s urging, Golden State has been calling teams and offering to trade Ellis all week. Read More »

Between the Delonte West fiasco and the team’s back to back losses to begin the ’09-10 campaign, it hasn’t been the smoothest start for the Cleveland Cavaliers. With 80 games to go this season, there isn’t any reason for the team or fans to start panicking yet. But they should definitely be worried. Read More »

ESPN’s Chris Broussard is reporting that the Stephen Jackson trade talk has heated up for the Golden State Warriors. Broussard stresses that these are strictly rumors at this point, but mentions that team’s like the Cavs, Nuggets, Spurs, Hornets and Clippers might be interested in acquiring Jackson. The Warriors apparently are interested in Manu Ginobili from the Spurs or Zydrunas Ilgauskas from the Cavs.

Source: ESPN

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: Shaquille O’Neal, Jamario Moon, Anthony Parker, Leon Powe, Danny Green, Coby Karl

Lost: Joe Smith, Ben Wallace, Wally Szczerbiak, Sasha Pavlovic, Lorenzen Wright, Tarence Kinsey Read More »

As we anticipate the commencement of the brand spanking new 2009-10 NBA season, let’s take a look at a handful of fantasy “gangs.” To be more specific, let’s give fun names to certain groups of players who have similar attributes — for fantasy purposes, of course. Hopefully, this post will do two things: offer you some helpful glimpses into what you should expect from these players heading into the regular season, and present you with an amusing read to help you rediscover your smile (especially if you drafted Blake Griffin) and regular breathing patterns amid all the tense eagerness for tonight. Read More »

With most of their guys back healthy from the flu and various other injuries, the Cavs smashed the Mavs by 30 last night at the University of Pittsburgh gym. (Since when do Cleveland teams get love in Pittsburgh?) Mo Williams had 16 points and 11 assists, LeBron put up 12 points on 3-of-13 shooting and seven dimes, and Big Z scored 16 off the bench … Dallas was the team playing short-handed, as Dirk, J-Kidd and Jason Terry were given the night off, and Josh Howard and Shawn Marion are still banged up. So the starting five looked like this: J.J. Barea, Matt Carroll, Quinton Ross, Drew Gooden and Erick Dampier. Pretty sure the Pitt Panthers squad would be able to give that lineup at least a decent run. Hell, put Sam Young and DeJuan Blair back on the squad and they might pull off a W … Read More »

For NBA teams, the quest for a title starts right now as training camp opens this week. While the Lakers are the champs and arguably the favorites to win it again this year, the rest of the league did not sit idle during the offseason. A lot of teams - especially the ones in contention for the chip - made some bold moves during the summer that strengthen their roster. I ranked the five teams who I thought made the best offseason upgrades. Read More »

You want to cause a splinter within the ranks of the Solar Temple of Michael Jordan followers? Ask them whether they think MJ’s second comeback with the Wizards was a good idea. It’s like if Lauryn Hill dropped an album this year: Half her fans would be thrilled to snatch up anything by L-Boogie, while the other half would be terrified of the potential damage to her legacy when she’s clearly not at the top of her game right now.

But really, the concept of “going out on top” is one that has become strangely unique to sports. Read More »

Even the worst team in the NBA is one monster season by one player away from getting back in the playoff race. And it doesn’t always have to be a superstar putting in an MVP-caliber effort, either. Earlier this week (Part 1 and Part 2) I looked at some ‘09 Lottery teams and pinpointed one player who can get them back into postseason contention in 2010. Here are the remaining five guys in need of a big year… Read More »

Does anybody want to play for Team USA anymore? The list of guys who have dropped out of this year’s USA Basketball mini-camp (which starts tomorrow) was already getting long — Brandon Roy, David Lee, David West, Big Baby Davis, Andrew Bynum and LaMarcus Aldridge among them — and then yesterday a couple more confirmed they won’t be participating: Read More »