Posts Tagged ‘Rudy Gay’

< Older Entries

Small Markets Scrap For Success

May 23, 2013  ·  10:57AM

memphis-fans

HANG TIME SOUTHWEST – When a couple small-market Western Conference teams battled for seven grueling games in the semifinals of the playoffs two years ago, who could have foreseen that they would meet again this postseason — after each was forced to deal with the inescapable repercussions of the new Collective Bargaining Agreement?

Rudy Gay was injured and out of that postseason two years ago. But at only 24 and locked into a lucrative contract, the No. 8 pick of the 2006 NBA Draft was a central figure for the fast-rising Memphis Grizzlies. Yet on Jan. 30, 2013, Gay, the team’s leading scorer, was traded to Toronto.

In Oklahoma City, the Thunder were coming off a loss to the Miami Heat in the 2012 NBA Finals when, days before this season began, Thunder general manager Sam Presti dealt former No. 3 pick James Harden, just 23 and an integral part of the team’s success, to Houston.

In a postseason marked by a surprising domination of small-market teams — all four teams remaining in the playoffs are in the bottom half of the league in market size — the second-round showdown between the Grizzlies and Thunder (won by the Grizzlies in five games) demonstrated just what many teams have to do to thrive in the era of the still-new CBA.

“With the rules set up the way they are, there’s minimal room for error,” said Jason Levien, the first-year CEO of the Grizzlies under a new ownership group led by one of the world’s youngest tech billionaires, Robert Pera. “You’ve got to be very thoughtful in your approach to how you build your team, how you build a roster, and you’ve got to keep the cap and the tax in mind.”

.

Avoiding the taxes

Cap and tax are at the forefront of the strategy the Oklahoma City management team is using under the ownership of billionaire energy mogul Clay Bennett. Presti, who has managed to re-sign superstars Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, plus emerging power forward Serge Ibaka, to long-term deals that fit within the team’s cap structure, chose to hold firm to a policy of not commenting on matters related to the CBA.

In Memphis, where the Grizzlies will look to start digging out of a 2-0 hole against the San Antonio Spurs in Saturday’s Game 3 of the West finals (9 p.m., ESPN), Levien has defended the trade of Gay (for veteran small forward Tayshaun Prince and youngsters Ed Davis and Austin Daye) as being made to improve the team.

While that might be true — Memphis won a franchise-best 56 games after a strong start with Gay — the Grizzlies also got out of the $37.2 million owed to Gay over the next two seasons. Memphis will pay Prince, Davis and Daye a combined $26 million over that span ($22 million if Daye is not retained beyond next season). With Zach Randolph, Marc Gasol and Mike Conley owed a combined $40.9 million next season, keeping Gay and a payroll under the tax line (this season it was $70.3 million) would have been a near-impossibility. (more…)

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in 2013 NBA Playoffs / Comments (2) /

Grizzlies GM Envisioned A Future With Marc Gasol As A League Laughed

May 18, 2013  ·  8:54PM

HANG TIME SOUTHWEST – The Memphis Grizzlies’ six-year rise from bottom-of-the-barrel in the West to playing for the conference crown is a story of intuition, perseverance, patience and, some might rightfully say, vindication for general manager Chris Wallace.

“I never looked for vindication. That’s not something that motivates me,” Wallace said. “Winning takes care of all issues in this league. We felt we had to take chances.”

Hired by former Grizzlies owner Michael Heisley to remake a 22-win team that was of no competition, popularity-wise, for John Calipari‘s Memphis Tigers, Wallace put his vision in motion. When the team takes the court Sunday afternoon to begin the Western  Conference finals against the old standby San Antonio Spurs, the Memphis roster will include not one player from the day Wallace took control.

Rudy Gay, the last survivor, was dealt to Toronto in late January.

The first move for Wallace back in 2007 was drafting Mike Conley, now considered one of the most underrated point guards in the league. Conley was the No. 4 overall draft pick after Portland selected Greg Oden and Kevin Durant fell into Seattle’s lap and Atlanta tapped Al Horford.

The next move came on Feb. 1, 2008 and will go down as the franchise’s moment of truth. At that moment, however, it was perceived more like the moment of ultimate doom.

Wallace agreed to a trade that unleashed shockwaves of ridicule from, yes, the media, but also shockingly from within the league. The backlash, Wallace said, was so fierce that it damaged the team’s ability to conduct business in its own city as it set out to sell critical sponsorships and arena suites for the following season.

“People [potential clients] would list off all the big-name people [in the NBA] that had ridiculed us,” Wallace said. “It was like running the 100-meter dash with a 20-pound leg weight.”

Everyone knows the deal: Pau Gasol to the Lakers for his chubby, unheralded younger brother Marc Gasol, bust Kwame Brown, Javaris Crittenton and a couple first-round draft picks. Stunning criticism crushed Wallace for getting fleeced while being backhandedly credited for handing the post-Shaquille O’Neal Lakers the keys to certain championships.

“I expect the media to shoot from the hip and not study the deal. That’s to be expected,” Wallace said. “I just shook my head. I had never seen that kind of response from inside the league. I don’t deny that was the assist for two Lakers championships, but we had to shake things up. We had never won a playoff game. We had been in the 20s [wins] and there was complete apathy in our market. Calipari and the Tigers were roaring at the time.

“When we went around the league, we weren’t going to get a tit-for-tat deal. We wanted to bring our salary structure down, get assets and draft picks. And no one else had a Marc Gasol.”

Marc Gasol attended high school in Memphis as Pau was becoming the franchise’s all-time leading scorer. At 18, he returned to Spain to begin his professional career in the Spanish ACB league, largely considered the world’s second-most competitive league. In 2007-08 he was tearing it up.

“He was trending up so much at the time. He was on pace to be the ACB MVP,” Wallace said. “I said it at the time, I felt like the little boy crying wolf. There was no question Pau was going to flourish next to Kobe and could win several titles, but this deal couldn’t be judged for several years.”

Wallace said what puzzled him most about the barrage of criticism was the lack of knowledge among media and league insiders regarding the 7-foot-1 Marc Gasol, who went on to become the MVP.

“It’s not like he was playing in Mongolia,” Wallace said. “He was playing in the ACB.”

Gasol, about 20 pounds lighter these days at 260, blossomed into a 2012 All-Star and is the 2013 Defensive Player of the Year. He’s become an offensive force, honing a dangerous post game with an old-school mid-range set shot. He’s averaging 18.3 ppg and 7.9 rpg while averaging 40.3 mpg during the franchise’s most successful postseason run.

Gasol’s low-post partner Zach Randolph came next in a deal in 2009. Wallace was in the right place at the right time, nabbing Randolph for Quentin Richardson. Randolph, who had had his issues at previous stops,had become expendable after just 39 games with the Clippers because L.A. was set to draft Blake Griffin with the No. 1 pick and wanted to clear out the power forward position.

Tony Allen was picked up in the summer of 2010. Darrell Arthur has been a constant presence off the bench since being acquired on draft day in 2008. Greivous Vasquez, the 28th pick in 2010, was flipped for key reserve Quincy Pondexter. Sixth man Jerryd Bayless was signed as a free agent last summer.

“We were winning 20 games a year just four or five seasons ago,” Conley said. “Management did a great job getting guys in, guys that care. We’ve worked every day, kind of fell down the radar and now we’re here.”

So much has gone right leading to this historic moment for the Grizzlies franchise that it would seem clear-cut that Wallace has a long-term home with Memphis. But with new ownership having taken over at the start of the season, both Wallace and coach Lionel Hollins – a raging success story in his own right as he’s developed an initially young group of players into a hard-working defensive juggernaut emblematic of the city itself — are uncertain of their futures.

Hollins has coached all season on the final year of his deal. Wallace said he has years left, but has no guarantees.

“I hope to be able to stay here,” Wallace said.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in 2013 Conference Finals: Spurs-Grizzlies, 2013 NBA Playoffs / Comments (47) /

Defensive-Minded: Success For Grizzlies’ Allen’s A Mix Of Trust, Belief, Resiliency

May 15, 2013  ·  9:46AM

.

OKLAHOMA CITY – Long before Tony Allen became a fixture on NBA All-Defensive Teams and back when the Oklahoma City Thunder still belonged to Seattle, some Oklahoma basketball fans cheered a hard-scrabble Chicago kid who serendipitously landed in rural Stillwater and has never stopped surviving.

Those Oklahoma faithful might now wish the most influential father figure in Allen’s life, a career college basketball assistant coach named Glynn Cyprien, had never left Oklahoma State to later wind up at the University of Memphis. Because the man who delivered the little-known junior-college guard with a knack for finding trouble to Eddie Sutton’s Oklahoma State Cowboys in 2003 also greased Allen’s free-agent signing seven years later, leaving the championship-caliber Boston Celtics for the then-middling Memphis Grizzlies.

“We never would have gotten him without Glynn,” said Grizzlies general manager Chris Wallace, who also has longtime ties to Cyprien. “Tony helped put us over the top.”

Named to a third consecutive All-Defensive Team on Monday and a second consecutive First Team selection, Allen is tormenting overtaxed Oklahoma City superstar Kevin Durant and breaking the hearts of Thunder fans in this semifinal series the Grizzlies lead, 3-1.

Allen and the Grizzlies return tonight to Oklahoma City (9:30 ET, TNT), about an hour drive southwest of Stillwater, to try and close out the reigning-but-wounded Western Conference champs in Game 5.

Memphis had never won a playoff series before Allen signed in 2010. It hadn’t made the postseason since 2006. But this blue-collar bunch, epitomized by Allen’s tireless and genuine grit, is one win away from the team’s first conference final in its 18-year existence.

Allen’s story is all about timing, trust, belief and resiliency. Start with beating back life’s hard knocks — a father in prison, an adolescence set up to be knocked down like bowling pins — with an unbreakable spirit. He’s scraped away at a nine-year NBA career that’s finally in full bloom, having persevered through season after season of seemingly two steps forward, one step back. His is an evolutionary journey of constant self-improvement and forever proving his worth — through six seasons in Boston and, even initially in Memphis under coach Lionel Hollins — just to play.

In his second season at Oklahoma State, Allen carried the Cowboys to the 2004 Final Four as the Big 12 Player of the Year just two years after getting kicked out of his first of two junior-college stops. But that misfortune landed him at Wabash Valley College in Mount Carmel, Ill. That’s where Cyprien was dispatched by Sutton, not to recruit Allen, but to bring back a stud named Antwain Barbour, who would eventually sign with Kentucky and never play a minute in the NBA. It was Allen who kept catching Cyprien’s eye.

“Tony’s statistics weren’t great, but he had an overall good game, he played defense, he ran well and bottom line he was just real tough,” said Cyprien, now an assistant coach at Texas A&M. “When the game got late, he made tough plays.”

It’s his NBA calling card. And Durant and the Thunder are witnesses. Allen tilted the razor-thin margin in this series when Hollins finally called upon the 6-foot-4, self-proclaimed “junkyard dog” to sic the three-time scoring champ in the final three minutes of a nip-and-tuck Game 2. The call could have come in Game 1, when Durant scored 12 of his 35 points in the fourth quarter including the game-winner with 11 seconds to play. But Hollins was sticking to his original declaration that Allen would be no match for the impossibly long Durant.

Allen shrugged and suggested Hollins got desperate as the Grizz were in jeopardy of falling into a 2-0 hole against a team playing without its All-Star point guard, Russell Westbrook.

Yet maybe that’s just the way it’s supposed to be for Allen, nothing ever coming without outside doubt, nothing ever certain, always having to prove himself over again. Even to his coach of three seasons, unless, as Allen was asked after the Game 2 win when he held Durant scoreless in those decisive final minutes, maybe Hollins was trying to inspire him.

“I don’t play mind games. I just go out there and do my job,” Allen said. “My confidence is always sky-high. If you try to limit me, then you limit me. But I will continue to show you that I work and I continue to get better each and every day. Whatever your limitations are on me, I am always ready to prove you wrong.” (more…)

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in 2013 Conference Semis: Thunder-Grizzlies, 2013 NBA Playoffs, HT News / Comments (11) /

Grizz Grind Step Closer To West Finals

May 14, 2013  ·  2:50AM

h

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Some of the new owners of this franchise now treading on historic playoff ground leaned up against the wall outside the Memphis Grizzlies’ locker room. Hair was frazzled, faces were flush and breaths were still coming heavy as if they had just outrun the Boogie Man.

In some respects they had.

Monday’s 103-97 overtime victory over the shorthanded and succumbing Oklahoma City Thunder turned scary from the jump. Kevin Durant set the early tone, animated, vocal and doing his thing. Serge Ibaka suddenly rediscovered his shooting touch, Kevin Martin was hitting and young Reggie Jackson was doing his best Russell Westbrook impression.

The visitors had the bounce and the confidence early. The Grindhouse crowd grew restless, boos came down when Durant buried a 3-pointer, his third without a miss, to put OKC ahead 46-29 with 4:26 until halftime. They’d since seen this horror flick before. Game 4 against these Thunder two years ago was a hot topic at practice the day before. OKC was then the team that trailed by 17 and came back all the way back to win it in triple-overtime to tie the series and eventually win it in Game 7.

Games 1 and 7 at home last season against the Clippers. Series over. Season wiped out.

To not take this Game 4 by the throat, to walk off the floor with tails tucked between their legs in front of a sellout crowd, to drag a 2-2 tie instead of riding a 3-1 lead back to Bricktown would have been a travesty.

“Our whole mindset was get it to 10 by halftime and we got it to eight,” Tony Allen said. “Coach [Lionel Hollins] came in the locker room. He’s good with those speeches. We wanted to respond.”

These Grizzlies, more mature, more clutch than any incarnation before, refused to let it happen. Tayshaun Prince and Allen clamped down on Durant, who missed 17 of his 27 shots, missed all four in overtime and missed his third clutch free throw in the last two games. Mike Conley scored 24 points and for a time matched Durant 3-pointer for 3-pointer. He played 48 minutes, 40 seconds — 21 ticks more than Durant and turned the ball over exactly once.

Then it was big Marc Gasol, with 23 points and 11 boards, swishing the game-winning jumper from the foul line. Then it was Allen, the original grit-and-grinder who was named to the NBA All-Defensive First Team earlier Monday, making the game-sealing steal. It was his 10th of the series, this one on Derek Fisher‘s crossed-up inbounds pass. (more…)

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in 2013 Conference Semis: Thunder-Grizzlies, 2013 NBA Playoffs / Comments (65) /

History Says Grizz Can’t Let Up At Home

May 13, 2013  ·  1:07PM

.

MEMPHIS, Tenn. – May 9, 2011. It’s a date the Memphis Grizzlies still can’t let go. Game 4. Triple-overtime. Oklahoma City 133, Memphis 123. Series tied. Back to OKC.

“We all remember that game,” said Memphis point guard Mike Conley, whose team finds itself in the same position tonight entering Game 4 at home with a 2-1 semifinal series lead. “We know how big it is, how it can turn a series. We remember the way they came back to win.”

Conley watched the final two overtimes of that critical, heart-thumping loss dejectedly from the bench after fouling out. He acknowledged that he had already been looking ahead. The day before, the Dallas Mavericks advanced to the West finals with a sweep of the Los Angeles Lakers.

“We had played Dallas well and we were thinking if we can get by Oklahoma City,” said Conley, then just a 23-year-old reveling in his first postseason. “So we were getting ahead of ourselves.”

Rudy Gay was injured and not playing for Memphis in that series. Oklahoma City is grinding out this low-scoring series with two key components gone: James Harden obviously is now an All-Star with the Houston Rockets, and Russell Westbrook, who scored 40 points in the triple-OT win two years ago, is out with a knee injury.

His absence hasn’t diminished the competitiveness of the series. All three games have been up for grabs in the final three minutes. In Game 3, Memphis nearly coughed up the homecourt edge it seized with its Game 2 win at OKC by losing an early nine-point cushion in the fourth quarter and then seeing a 79-73 lead with 4:19 to go evaporate to an 81-81 tie with 1:58 left.

“We were in this situation two years ago and they came in here and tied it up,” Zach Randolph said. “So we’ve got to come out and play better as a team and make adjustments.”

Applying a foot to the throat of an opponent on their home floor would be an adjustment the Grizz would love to make. They couldn’t do it against OKC in 2011. Last year they blew a 27-point lead with an abysmal fourth quarter and lost Game 1 in the first round to the Los Angeles Clippers, and then ducked out of the series in Game 7 with another awful final period.

Maybe the killer instinct is evolving. Memphis won Games 3 and 4 last round against the Clippers to tie it up and then closed it out at home in Game 6. A win tonight would put the Grizzlies in position to eliminate the Thunder in Game 5 on Wednesday and catch a rest while the San Antonio-Golden State series is set to go at least six games.

“We’re taking it one day at a time, that’s been the motto since Day 1,” Tony Allen said. “We’re not looking back towards [two years ago]. We’re thinking about what’s now, what’s ahead. The better we’re focused, the more we can be engaged of what they’re trying to do, looking at their adjustments, the better we are.”

Marc Gasol, taking nothing for granted, said: ”The series is just starting.”

Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in 2013 Conference Semis: Thunder-Grizzlies, 2013 NBA Playoffs, HT News / Comments (4) /

Hawks Will Rebuild From Scratch

May 4, 2013  ·  4:12PM





HANG TIME HEADQUARTERS – The locals will talk about it forever.

What would the Hawks have been like with Chris Paul or Deron Williams instead of Marvin Williams? Or Rudy Gay or Brandon Roy instead of Shelden Williams or basically anyone other than Speedy Claxton?

Conference finals appearances instead of first round exits? Global recognition of a basketball brand reborn with superstar talent instead of a league laughingstock (after a 13-win season in 2004-05) and the team that can always be counted on not to come through when they should?

Hypothetical questions with no clear-cut answers make the Hawks’ past every bit as murky as their immediate future. They enter free agency this summer with only six players under contract, four Draft picks (two in each round) and approximately $33.1 million in cap space for their GM, Danny Ferry, to work with in rebuilding the roster.

The Hawks choices in the Draft and free agency have come to define the franchise over the past eight years more so than anything they have actually done on the court. They ended an eight-year playoff drought after the 2007-08 season with a core group of Joe Johnson, Josh Smith, Al Horford, Mike Bibby, Josh Childress, Marvin Williams, Zaza Pachulia, Shelden Williams and Acie Law. That group kicked off a run of six straight playoff appearance that came crashing to an ugly end Friday night at Philips Arena in a Game 6 loss to the Indiana Pacers in their first round series.

It was the official end to not only their season but also an era for the Hawks, who have just three players — Horford, Lou Williams and rookie John Jenkins – under guaranteed contacts for next season. Even Hawks coach Larry Drew, who has been on staff (the last three as head coach) throughout this entire era, does not have a contract for next season.

We’ve seen the last of these Hawks as we know them, Drew acknowledged as much after the Game 6 loss.

“Even with the injuries to Zaza and Lou, we were able to juggle some things around, move people around,” Drew said. “And we stayed together. We did not fragment. We stayed together even when it got tough. A lot of people didn’t predict us to make the playoffs. No one gave us a chance, but this group hung in there. They persevered and I’m really proud of them.”

It was an honorable finish to a tumultuous season for all involved. A team loaded with three times as many pending free agents as players under guaranteed contracts, has issues that go above and beyond the professionalism required to do the job under those circumstances.

That said, Ferry is sticking to his plan. He’s going to be rebuilding basically from scratch, with nine players heading into free agency July 1.

Smith, one of the only remaining building blocks from the franchise’s last rebuild and a long-time source of division within the franchise (some folks loved the hometown kid who flashed signs of being an All-Star caliber player over the years while others loathed the enigmatic performer who clashed with his coaches and drove fans nuts with his play), going into the summer as one of the marquee names on the market.

It’s time for Smith and the Hawks to go their separate ways, amicably, of course. Everyone involved knows that it’s time for a mutual parting of the ways for the good of all involved.

Point guard Jeff Teague is a restricted free agent and while he’s shown loads of improvement since Drew took over for Woodson, there remain questions about whether or not he is best suited as the starting point guard for this team.

Ferry can make a clean break from the Hawks’ recent past, from all of the second-guessing, head-scratching and eye-rolling that has surrounded the Hawks for years. No one will vilify him for cleaning up the mess made before he arrived last summer, the one he started clean up himself by moving both Johnson and Marvin Williams in trades last summer.

It’s the uncertainty of what’s to come, however, that makes skeptical Hawks fans nervous. There will be big fish on the free agent market, guys like Los Angeles Lakers’ big man and Atlanta native Dwight Howard and the Los Angeles Clippers’ Paul, stars capable of turning an uncertain situation around by signing their names on the dotted line.

The Hawks have the necessary resources to pursue those two, who will be first and second, in whatever order, on every free agent wish list of a team with money to spend this summer.

The summer of 2013 is the Hawks’ biggest since the summer of 2005, when Johnson (sign-and-trade) and Marvin Williams (No. 2 pick overall in the Draft) were added to the mix. That was the beginning of a painstaking rebuilding process that ultimately led to six straight playoff appearances, the second-best stretch of its kind in the Hawks’ Atlanta history.

For a franchise that has endured a recent stretch of complete insignificance during that playoff drought, followed by the past six postseason runs, a return to the non-playoff abyss is a bit frightening.

That’s what made the end of Friday night so bittersweet for Horford, who has only known the playoffs during his time with the Hawks and in the league.

“I feel for our fans,” he said. “I know they wanted us to do better. I felt like, as a team, we did about as much as we could. We had some adversity and we handled it well. We had a good season, looking at the big picture. One thing I appreciate about these guys was how they competed. Even tonight, we could’ve gone the other way. That is something I’m proud of the guys for.”

The “guys” will look a lot different next season.

In fact, Horford might be one of the only truly familiar faces around if Ferry carries out his master plan.

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in 2013 NBA Playoffs / Comments (34) /

Two Coaches With Everything To Lose

April 24, 2013  ·  4:52PM

LOS ANGELES – Opposing playoff coaches Vinny Del Negro and Lionel Hollins have a lot in common. Both men have improved their clubs’ winning percentage each season as coach. The last two soared over .600 for consecutive top-five finishes in the rugged Western Conference.

Both won 56 games this season to set each franchise’s record for most wins.

And, finally, job security: Neither man has it.

In a rare, but not unprecedented occurrence, the first-round playoff series between Del Negro’s Los Angeles Clippers and Hollins’ Memphis Grizzlies, a rematch of last season’s seven-game, first-round thriller won by L.A., features two lame-duck coaches.

While both have produced excellent seasons by any measure, one will be going home earlier than hoped. And despite public stamps of approval this week from their superiors, neither coach’s future is certain, and prior to Monday’s Game 2, neither was pretending otherwise.

“Would I liked to have had a contract before this? Of course,” said Hollins, now in his fifth consecutive season and third stint as the Grizzlies coach, a relationship that dates back to the franchise’s roots in Vancouver. “But that’s a decision that’s made and you go and do the best job you can, and it’s not like it had to be done before the season is over. It’s just like players, you can extend players early or you can wait till later. Guys become free agents and they go out in free agency and sometimes it gives you leverage and sometimes it doesn’t.”

Del Negro, who guided the Clippers to the franchise’s first Pacific Division title and first 50-win campaign in his third season and second with All-Star point guard Chris Paul, has been one of the most scrutinized coaches since Chicago Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf hired him without any coaching experience five years ago. Del Negro lasted two .500 seasons there before being fired and then hired by the Clippers.

L.A. advanced to the West semifinals last season, but with Paul and Blake Griffin banged up, was swept by the San Antonio Spurs. Del Negro said this season’s goal is to go deeper, which implies a goal of achieving another franchise milestone, a first conference final. It would take finishing off Memphis and then likely ousting the reigning West-champion Oklahoma City Thunder.

“I believe in what we’ve done here,” Del Negro said. “I think my assistant coaches have done a phenomenal job and I’ve had great support from ownership and the front office … and everybody to try and put the best team out there possible.

“Right now the focus should be on the playoffs, should be on the players and the commitment that they’re putting in to help us be successful. And all those things (contract situation) will get answered at the end.” (more…)

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in 2013 NBA Playoffs, HT News / Comments (13) /

Air Check: Is This Basketball Or Hockey?

April 17, 2013  ·  12:41PM

HANG TIME NEW JERSEY – For NBA fans like us, there’s nothing better than League Pass. Having the ability to watch every game every night (and then again the next day) is heaven.

Of course, with local broadcasts, you get local broadcasters, which can be good and bad. It can be good, because these guys know their teams better than most national broadcasters. It can be bad, because these guys love their teams more than most national broadcasters. And they’re usually not afraid to show that love.

The national guys aren’t perfect either. And if they’re not careful, they may be featured here, where we highlight the best and worst of NBA broadcasts.

1. A perfectly unintentional body check

Game: Toronto at Washington, March 31
Broadcast: Toronto


As the weak-side guy on pick-and-roll coverage, you’re supposed to “chuck” the roll man, meaning that you should get into the paint and keep him from having a clear path to the basket. Rudy Gay goes a little too far here, body checking Jan Vesely like it was a Leafs-Caps game.

Gay is called for a Flagrant 1 foul on the play, a reasonable ruling which stands after review. And somehow, Matt Devlin and Leo Rautins feel like this was normal pick-and-roll defense.

Devlin: “There was no intent behind that.”

Rautins: “I think at times now things get a little carried away with whole idea of flagrant and intent and all that. That was just a hard foul.”

2. A run-of-the-mill assist of the year candidate

Game: Cleveland at New Orleans, April 7
Broadcast: New Orleans


If you’ve listened to Lakers games on League Pass the last two seasons, you know that new play-by-play man Bill Macdonald can get a little too excited when his team scores a basket (or just when Metta World Peace attempts a 3-pointer).

It’s a contrast to former Lakers play-by-play man Joel Meyers, who is now calling games for the Hornets. Here, Meyers calls this ridiculous, no-look, through-the-legs Kyrie Irving dime to Tristan Thompson like it was any old assist.

Personally, I’ll take the subdued Meyers over the hyper Macdonald. That pass probably called for a little more inflection, though.

3. All-Star sandwich

Game: Dallas at Denver, April 4
Broadcast: Denver


Scott Hastings is the King of Air Check.

Evan Fournier pushes Dirk Nowitzki in the back here, sending Nowitzki into a flying Kenneth Faried. Hastings, of course, immediately takes offense.

“I guarantee it’ll be here,” he says. “Dirk Nowitzki. Gotta protect him.”

The push is clear as day on the replay, but Hastings isn’t changing his tune.

“That’s a little bit of a Dirk flop and he gets rewarded, because he’s an All-Star.”

4. I can block shots like that

Game: Denver at Dallas, April 12
Broadcast: Dallas


When JaVale McGee blocks a shot a couple of feet above the basket, Mavs broadcaster Jeff Wade goes into some pretty funny schtick about playing against 10 year olds on an 8-foot rim.

***

John Schuhmann is a staff writer for NBA.com. Send him an e-mail or follow him on twitter.

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in Air Check / Comments (22) /

Prince: Grizz’s 2011 Playoff Run Without Gay Aided Transition

April 16, 2013  ·  3:32PM

DALLAS – Want to know why teammates respect and admire Tayshaun Prince? Traded from the Detroit Pistons, the franchise he loyally clung to through the lean, post-championship years, he’s now just days away from beginning his first postseason since 2009 with the Memphis Grizzlies.

Is he excited to be back in the playoffs?

“I am excited,” Prince said after scoring a dozen points in the Grizzlies’ 103-97 win Monday against the Mavericks. “I’m more excited for Ed Davis, and I’m more excited for Austin Daye. Austin’s been with me for four years now. He was with me in the tough days in Detroit. I’m excited for those guys.”

For the third-year Davis and the fourth-year Daye, it will be their first forays beyond the regular season.

Prince, 33, an integral member of the 2004 champion Pistons, is one of the league’s most unassuming, thoughtful and grounded players. He goes to work and gives all he has to give, then does it again the next day and the next day. His 10-year run in Detroit ended in late January with a three-way trade. Memphis dealt the still quite youthful Rudy Gay to Toronto and Davis landed in Memphis along with the veteran Prince and his Pistons teammate Daye.

“I’m one of the last guys in this league that would let something affect me if somebody said why would they trade for an old, veteran guy and this and that,” said Prince, who acknowledged that the deal did take him by surprise. “I don’t care what people say about me. I have fun with it, I roll with it, it doesn’t bother me. At the end of the day, we’ve got some good pieces.”

From a personality standpoint, the old veteran and his new, rather old-fashioned, grind-it-out team have been a near-perfect match with their blue collars raised proudly.

“I love Tayshaun,” Grizzlies center Marc Gasol said. “I love the way he plays, I love what he brings to the team, I love his leadership and the way he approaches the game of basketball.”

And Grizzlies fans have to be relieved and pleased with what they’ve seen after initial apprehension to Memphis’ new ownership group breaking up the long-held core of Gay, Gasol, Zach Randolph, Mike Conley and Tony Allen before they could make a playoff run as a fully healthy unit.

Last year, Randolph was gimpy into the playoffs following a knee injury, and reserve forward Darrell Arthur missed the entire season. The Grizzlies blew Games 1 and 7 on their home floor and bowed out to the Clippers in the first round. The year before, Gay missed the playoffs with a shoulder injury that required surgery. Without him, the Grizzlies upset top-seeded San Antonio in the first round and took Oklahoma City to seven games in the second round.

Prince suggested that the 2011 run has actually helped boost this team’s confidence as they’ve meshed since the trade. They’ve reeled off 26 wins in 37 games and at 55-26, the Grizzlies have won the most games in a season in the franchise’s history.

“If you really look at it, that’s what made them the team they are. They found out they can play without him,” Prince said, referring to Gay’s playoff absence. “They found out that, ‘Hey, we can still compete at a high level because of the toughness, the team, the camaraderie.’

“So when they traded for me, I believe they were down when the trade first happened because they played with Rudy for so long and they were familiar with him. But I think after a few games, they were like, ‘You know what, we had a while where we didn’t play with Rudy and things were working out well for us. This may not be a bad idea; hey, this might work.’ At the end of the day, it’s all about competing and having fun. These guys are really tough-minded guys.

“Hopefully we’ll have a good chance at doing something special.”

Tags: , , , , , , ,
Posted in HT News / Comments (7) /

NBA Players #PrayForBoston

April 15, 2013  ·  7:34PM



HANG TIME HEADQUARTERS – The shocking events of this afternoon in Boston touched off passionate reactions from folks all over the country and all around the globe, and NBA players were not immune.

With the details on exactly what happened and why at the finish line of Monday’s Boston Marathon still being investigated, the response of players on Twitter was swift and simple. And it echoed the sentiment of a nation.

Everyone is concerned for the citizens of Boston and beyond that have been impacted by this tragedy:

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in HT News / Comments (31) /

< Older Entries