What didn't go well for Orlando was the fact 3 of their rotation players showed up (VC, Howard, Pietrus) and the other five took the night off. Those other five went 7-32 from the floor, took 2 total foul shots and scored 19 points in 116 minutes of basketball. That's about as putrid as you can get.

One of the reasons Utah struggles so badly on the road (and the Nuggets to a degree) is that they foul like crazy. They give up 1 more FT a game, but play at a slower pace than the Nuggets. They also get to the line a ton, 2nd to Denver in the NBA. What happens to both teams is when they get a bad whistle, they struggle to score when it counts. OKC went to the line 35 times last night. That makes up for struggling with the three ball.

True, but you also have to remember that Jeff Green also can just as easily slide into the 3 when they play two bigs and Westbrook can play the 2 when Maynor is on the floor. It's not ideal with Harden out, but with the versitility in the starting lineup, it's not a disaster.

definitely, but considering Durant plays 40 minutes that doesn´t leave a ton of minutes for Green to "slide down" as i assume they won´t revive the "Durant at the 2" experiment, would they ? Well, doesn´t leave a ton of minutes to be filled anyway, so my post definitely wasn´t meant as "oh no, thunder are in trouble", just felt like mentioning it in light of the Jazz missing players ;)

@ TroyF : True, but in general it´s amazing how much improved their (OKC) offense is, even while lacking the "bail out" ability to shoot long jumpers, especially for a young team i find that just great.

They are 5th in the league in PPG since the all star break at 105 a game (admittedly the schedule was favourable), can´t find much in avanced split stats right now but pretty sure they have just gotten better there.

And last night ? 32 of 43 on shots within 15 feet + 35 FTs ? That´s incredible.
(stats courtesy of hoopdata.com, great box scores for anyone wanting a bit more than the obvious)

whomario,

Agree on all counts. They are a smart team for being so young. That said, they are 13th in offensive efficiency. The strategy of 15 feet and in works vs. Utah. Especially a Utah without AK. They simply have zero shot blockers, no length and they foul repeatedly. That's a great recipe for any team.

I love OKC, think they'll win a title within five years and think they are the future of the division. But they aren't going to be successful with the 15 and in strategy against the Nuggets or Lakers. Too much size and too many athletes.

Utah just impresses the hell out of me. I hate them, I really, really hate them. But they are playing over their heads and have for awhile now. They are impressive. Utah and OKC could easily end up playing in round one. That'd be a hell of an opening round series.

Is this where we hear about how the stats support Melo as being the most clutch player? :)

Steph Curry looks good running the point, but then he's -16 through 3 quarters. It can't help when your team is starting 2 D-League players against the Lakers.

I love watching Steph Curry play.

:+1:

Curry´s +- (and similar) numbers don´t look too good, but you can´t use them with a straight face when the Warriors (and Don nelson) are involved.

Take a look at Ellis´ numbers though, 12 (!) points worse when he´s on the court (and i admit that it didn´t translate into wins when he was out).
Those are ridiculous numbers. And those minutes he´s not playing mostly coincide with Curry playing instead and running the point, Curry´s numbers get dragged down when playing together with Ellis i guess as it feels like they are allways going on runs when Curry plays with Watson or Morrow (Ellis was right about them not being a good fit in the backcourt, only that amazingly he might be the odd man out afterall)

His defense needs work, but once he gets to play under an actual coach and next to an actual SG (and maybe with an actual big man or 2) that´ll improve by default.
But his offense :thumbsup: So fun to watch :popcorn:

Warriors got outrebounded 56-25 btw, that has to be some sort of record... They also forced Bynum and Bryant into 17 combined turnovers and commited just 5 all game themselves.
Just crazy numbers all around.

Proud of the Rockets not packing it in :) Chances of still making the playoffs are slim to none, but that´s ok this year.
Jordan Hill hasn´t looked half bad from what i´ve seen.
Anthony was amazing in the 2nd half !


EDIT : That last shot by Ellis that just missed was pretty sick, would have made an apearance in every "top plays of the season" list if that had gone in. But Anthony Morrow was wiiiiide open with his feet set just to his left ...

Well, hitting a contested, fade away three over Shane Battier isn't exactly easy for anyone to do, clutch or not. (even with the miss, Melo is about 20% points better than Kobe at last second shots) That was a frustrating game from a Nuggets fans perspective to watch. The Rockets threw in some absolute prayers, had 15 more FT attempts (despite playing more physical defense) and would not freakin die when they were supposed to die. Also yet another injury for the Nuggets. Anderson went down with a tweaked ankle and only played 16 minutes. No kenyon, no Ty and no Birdman for the fourth quarter, I can't believe this team continues to fight through all of this.

As the Nuggets tend to do, they also showed some incredibly poor management down the stretch. Melo hits a shot with 1:21 left to put the Nuggets up five. He then doesn't touch the ball until there are 20 second left in the game. (where he hits the game tying shot on a drive) Why the Nuggets felt the need to go away form a guy who was simply torching the Battier, Ariza and anyone else they wanted to put on him is beyond me. (also beyond me is how Jordan Hill took 7 free throws to Melo's 6 and only played 11 minutes.) It's stupidity like that which will cost the Nuggets in the playoffs if they aren't careful.

Just a tough loss. But also a happy one. Credit to Brooks (the guy hit some critical shots) and Scola (as we talked about earlier, amazing player)

Curry has vaulted over Evans on my ROY ballot. No disrespect to Evans, he's the guy who will probably win it. Curry just continues to play amazing basketball for an amazingly dysfunctional team. How he plays with Ellis and doesn't pull an Arenas type threat with a gun is beyond me. Ellis is just brutal.

Luc Richard Mbah a Moute Official Website

Great site, I love Luc Richard

That is so funny, I was just about to post this, too. Great web site for a good young player and a great young man. I miss having The Prince in Westwood.

apparently i deleted the part where i called the Timberwolves the laziest defensive team of the last 5 years, so instead of just quoting that i have to write it again : They are the laziest team of the last 5 years. For a young team that´s like a death sentence ...
But boy dd the Suns take advantage of that, holy smokes :eek: 152 points, 37 assists, 7 TOs and i can´t wait for the number of fast break points ...
Barbosa with his first game back :)

Thabeet 10/9 with 2 blocks starting for Gasol (strained neck) against the Bulls reserves (Deng, Noah, Hinrich, Rose out)

Lebron James is averaging 30/8/10 with just 2.5 TOs since the all star break (and basicall since the start of february) :eek:

Yeah, nice to see the TWolves show up last night. Ridiculous game.

I was going to post today about how you can tell it's playoff time for some of the huge stars in the league. Look at March numbers for some guys:

James - 28-9-9, 2.8 TO, 50% shooting
Wade - 30-5-8, 3.4 TO, 48% shooting
Melo - 29-8-4, 2.3 TO, 50% shooting
Kobe - 29-6-6, 4.0 TO, 45% shooting
Amare - 28-10, 55% shooting

I didn't throw in Dwight or Durant as they've stayed consistent. Many of the stars look like they are playing their best basketball headed into the postseason.

It's going to be a good playoffs.

Think so as well, really looking forward to it allready (well, basically since all star break, the regular season is too damn long).

In that post earlier pointing out the Timberwolves defensive "effort" i failed to make clear that i just love watching the Suns on offense. The Warriors i have trouble watching because they are just too damn chaotic and unstructured, but the Suns well oiled offense ? Great to watch.

Heck, they are leading the league in effective FG% for the 6th straight season and have been 1 or 2 for 3 seasons each in offensive efficiency (points per 100 possessions), that´s just amazing.

Anyone watch the Miller vs Knicks doc on ESPN (TSN in Canada)? I thought it was well done. And I was happy with it. And then after the credits, they show one of my most hated plays in NBA history. I was so irate when it happened in 1999 (?), and then they had to show it... :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

I'm going to need more information to figure out what play you're talking about.

The 4-point play by Larry Johnson. I hated that play so much, what a bad foul to call.

That was a Stern call. Until he's gone and the reffing gets a complete revamp, we are going to see garbage like that continue. (Lakers/Kings fourth quarter, Jordan push off to win game, LJ 4 point play. . . it's comical how many times NBA refs have decided major games or series with calls where a 3 year old could do a better job)

I loved that LJ 4-point play, Gramma 'Ma was cool. You guys are haters.

I actually love LJ. . . loved Jordan. . . (I can't say the same about the Lakers)

The call was a joke. Not hating, just stating fact.

Gramma 'Ma was alright. LJ was OK in my books until that 4-point play. Not his fault, but he became the face for one of my most hated plays ever.

Hubie Brown giving CofC a shoutout after Anthony Johnson's fadeaway (plus the foul) <3

Nice to see Rashard Lewis having a good night after a poor stretch of late (hell, most of the season really).

Durant just went 15-15 from the FT line in the first half against the Raptors, 71-44 Thunder. Bosh must on the verge of punching a couple of his teammates.
71 points in a half despite shooting just 41% from the field thanks to Durant´s FTs and 15 offensive rebounds (again, at the half this is).

Just thought i´d post that, haven´t seen anything from the game admittedly due to the NCAA tournament.

Rodney Stuckey back after his health scare :)

Saw Lebron live tonight going against the Bulls D-League squad (Rose, Noah, Deng were out). Bulls actually kept it real close throughout and could have won it if they hit any sort of shots.

Lebron seemed to coast through the first 3 quarters. In fact, the Cavs were doing better with him on the bench. Bulls rookie James Johnson was doing a real good job on him. So the Bulls go on a nice run to tie it and Lebron decides he's had enough playing around and just puts them away. He hit a couple jumpers and had an amazing 3-point play (falling off balance he kind of threw it at the hoop one-handed). He is amazing.

I do wonder what he would be like if he stopped with the dancing and jokes and just went hardcore for a season. I think he could shatter some records and put up some ridiculous numbers (along with winning perhaps 70 games). He's just unstoppable when he wants to get serious. From a sheer domination standpoint, I want to say he might be better than Jordan. Jordan however had more passion for winning.

Goofy side note, but where the fuck did all the Cavs fans come from? I'd say about 10% of the fans were in Cavs attire (mostly Lebron jerseys) and cheering for him. I'm guessing if he ends up in New York next year, the Cavs fans will go back to zero at Bulls home games. The NBA has perhaps the most fairweathered fans of all sports. :)

Warriors :lol: The Spurs scored 147 against them despite going 17/32 from the FT line, hitting just 6 threes and Ginobili plazing 22 minutes (23 and 11 assists) and Duncan 14 minutes (17/6/5 with no TO 8/8 from the field ...)

Spurs outrebound them 55/29, have 39 assists and shoot 65% from the field and had 121 points after the 3rd quarter :eek:

That Reggir Williams kid on the Warriors looks good, not just scoring but has nice bball iq and can pass the ball.

Darko with a real nice game against the Lakers, 16/12/3 with a block in 30 minutes... Had to leave the game though with what seemed like acute back spasms...

Suns win against the Jazz (no Kirilenko, Okur only 12 minutes) , Nash 15/10 but the real story were Brook Lopez (19/10) and Amare dominating Boozer/millsapp . Amare with a ridiculous scoring night : 44 points on 14-16 FG and 16-18 FTs. Zero Assists and 5 TOs, but lets not be picky ;)


Blazers win on a blatant travel by Roy. Seriously ...

I think Lebron would be a worse player if he went "hardcore". I could see him trying that and just overdoing it because that is not his personality. What would he need to do? Take more shots? Slapped Daniel Gibson for not practicing hard ? The dancing and such will lessen with time and maturity though not disappear completely. I don't question his commitment to winning in the least bit.

I simply give up. The Nuggets came out and said that Anthony Carter will get the majority of the backup minutes, even with Ty Lawson healthy. I hate every last coach who made the decision, I just can't say it enough. Watching the second unit suck ass against the Knicks now. Instead of Ty running up and down the floor wrecking havoc, I'm watching AC play ball like a retarded monkey. They scored 4 points in the six minutes AC played. He leaves and they hit a three on their first possession. I'm not one of those people who loves their favorite player so much and thinks he should play 48 minutes.

But if you simply watch the two players, there is no question who the better option is. This coaching staff is moronic.

I feel like it's in Denver's best interest to trade us Lawson for anyone on the roster not named Jerebko. Hell take our 1st round pick because Joe D is going to fuck it up.

So Chad Ford has the Pistons taking Al-Farouq Aminu in his latest mock. This concerns me because he is as tight with Joe D as he probably is with any other GM in the NBA. Aminu is yet another SF we would waste a pick on.

I am honestly concerned about this being the pick, it'd be the worst conceivable thing ever.

@ TroyF : Did you see last nights Knicks-Nuggets game ? What did you think of Gallinari ? Impressed the heck out of me, going right at Melo and matching him striker for strike in the 2nd half. Melo got his, but Gallinari still played pretty decent defense on him and was very agressive on offense himself. I´m beginning to think he could actually become a good defender, definitely has the attitude and mindset to do so.
I mean, he´s regularly guarded the other teams best perimeter guy and not emberassed himself, did a great job on Joe Johnson a couple weeks ago as well and the Knicks are much better with him on the court than off.

Beaubois in march (10 games) : 13.3 PPG in 19 minutes, 56% shooting :) Last night ahead of Barrea on the depth chart after 2 games with spot minutes, right now he´s the better player.
The guy is a dynamite scorer off the bench.

The Phoenix-Golden State game 2 nights ago was unbelievably crazy, amazing atmosphere in Oakland and a full-on trackmeet with Don Nelson pulling a few crazy/great stunts, having Tollive distribute the ball from the high post and up (and having him bring it up as well) resulting in 25/12/5, running play after play for Reggie Williams resulting in 29 points on 10-16 shooting.
Both guys can play, Nellie or no Nellie ...

Phoenix with little good coming off the bench, but just enough to continue to play Nash just about 30 minutes (where he was a +15 in a 2 point game). Amare with 37/8 (12-15 FGs, 13-15 FT) and a ridiculous Fast Break dunk over Tolliver, measuring him up before going up and over him. Richardson had 34.
Stoudemire 30/10 in march on 60% from the field and just 17 FGA (due to 11 FTA and 87% shooting from the line).

This is why I hate AC.

Summer of 2004(I think) his agent "forgets" to pick up a player option for approx 6M dollars. The Heat suddenly have cap room and offer brand(which was matched) and odom(which wasn't) max deals. The heat get Odom for free. And then trade him and caron butler for shaq after a year.

The heat go on to win a disgusting title based on superstar calls for wade.

The lakers win a couple years later.

Don't care much, but the finish of the ATL-ORL game last night was pretty cool looking.

whomario,

I love Gallinari as a player. I think he's going to be very, very good. Actually picked him in a fantasy basketball keeper league and he's been a huge contributor to me all season long. The scary thing to me about him is if NY is able to get one of the stars to play with him. Wade or Lebron drawing a defense in and kicking to him? He'll be frightening to deal with.

The Nuggets are about toast. The longer they play without Kenyon, the more their defense gets exposed. Dantley may be a good coach down the road, but he's pretty bad at making any kind of major adjustment in a game. Carmelo is playing about the laziest defense he's ever player. (and that's saying something) And of course, they continue to play AC over Ty.

The last thing is seriously one of the dumbest things I've ever seen this organization do. (and this is the Nuggets, I've seen some ridiculous things guys) On one hand you have a guy who shoots jumpers at an under 40% clip and draws fouls at a 2.9% rate. On the other you have a guy who shoots jumpers over 50% and draws fouls at a 13.9% clip. One guy has a roland rating of +2, the other guy has a -7. If you don't like stats, just watch the guys play. It's pure lunacy what they decided to do after Ty's injury and I think they'll pay dearly for it.

I expect the Nuggets to be 5th in the West by the end of their road trip. Even if the light bulb turns on and they start to give Ty the minutes he deserves, he'll be rusty from sitting for a month. Then Kenyon is going to come back and also be rusty. I can't see anyway this team is playing well by the time the playoffs start. 5th seed in the west? Death. You aren't winning a grueling series in Utah/Dallas/Phoenix and then beating LA.

Not happening. This team had a ton of potential, but it's blowing up fast. Very sad end to what has been a great year.

Yes, that´s the new music video by the blatant Postal Service clone named Owl City and yes this is Shaq in it.

that´s weird and random on so many levels

Leonsis has agreed on a price with the Pollin family for the Wizards and the Verizon Center. Should be interesting to see if he brings the same marketing savvy to the Wizards. It's also an open question whether the same stadium revenue plan(100% for the Wizards) will stay or if the Caps will get more money.

Switch back to the bullets ASAP.

Well, it's half-time at the United Center in Chicago, and the Bulls are down to the Heat 33-66... sheesh.

This.

The Nets have won two in a row, giving them nine for the season and putting them in a tie with the 1972-73 Philadelphia 76ers. So at least they won't set a new record for futility.

Way to go Nets ... :) Lopez and Yi also put up one of the better C/PF statlines of the year combining for 68 points on 26-33 shooting (14-16FTs), Lopez 37 and Yi 31.

Darko with 14/4/5 (all 5 assists leading to layups right at the rim), although just 7-16 from the field. Got into foul trouble in the 2nd half unfortunately.

Oklahoma beats the Lakers at home comfortably, holding them to 47 points through 3 quarters :eek:

San Antonio beats Cleveland, Manu Ginobili has been spectacular lately and added another great game with 30/6/6.

Seeding in the West still wide open, will be interesting how it plays out.

In the East Chicago still has a chance to sneak in if they somehow win a few games and Toronto keeps on sucking ...

whomario, what do the highest paid players in Europe make? I'm asking because I heard Real Madrid offered Ginobili $14m per year, I was wondering if that would make him the highest paid player outside of the NBA.

Highest paid European players usually make in the 4 to 5 million range. The salaries have started to go up the last few years, but I think 14 million would make him the highest paid Euro by a long shot.

Nuggets won last night on a last second shot by Melo. For some unknown reason, they continue to give Anthony Carter 18 to 20 minutes a night despite having to play 4 on 5 on offense with him out there. Last night in the final 3 minutes, he threw up an air ball three then on the final Raptors possession Nene tipped the ball from Bosh, AC had it right in his hands and decided for some unknown reason to start running up the floor in a tie game with 20 seconds left. He lost the ball, Bosh recovered it and was fouled (well, he really wasn't fouled, but the moronic ref said he was) and went to the line with a chance to put the Raptors up 2.

I have no idea what the fascination with this guy is from the Nuggets staff. It's disgusting.

To me it seems like there is only one team in the west who wants the #2 seed. The Suns are playing some terrific basketball right now. Nuggets/Mavs/Jazz are all 6-4 in their last ten with some horrible losses.

@ Big Fo : that would make him the highest paid by a landslide. That number is also purely fictional :) There was an "insider" claiming that there was "talk" about Real having an interest on his twitter (throwing in the fact that Manu´s old coach from Bologna is coaching Real), which was then picked up by slamonline (and linked) and then other ran with it, but obviously they had to one-up that by throwing an astronomical number in that was nowhere to be found in the original news or any spanish article picking it up.

Gotta love the ethics of media nowadays :popcorn:


As to the highest paid players in Europe, a lot is more guesswork than with the NBA (no salary cap = no need to specify), but according to talkbasket and http://www.in-the-game.org :

1.	Josh Childress	Olympiacos	€4,500,000
2.	Theodoros Papaloukas	Olympiacos	€3,500,000
3.	Juan Carlos Navarro	Barcelona	€2,800,000
4.	Matjaz Smodis	CSKA Moscow	€2,500,000
5.	Linas Kleiza	Olympiacos	€2,300,000
6.	Dimitris Diamantidis	Panathinaikos	€2,100,000
7.	Ramunas Siskauskas	CSKA Moscow	€2,000,000
8.	Gordan Giricek	Fenerbahce	€2,000,000
9.	Nikola Vujcic	Olympiacos	€2,000,000
10.	Vassilis Spanoulis	Panathinaikos	€1,900,000

times 1.35 to get the dollar equivalent and that´s post taxes. And they don´t have any numbers for a few players i´d suspect to be somewhere in that range, but you get the general idea here.

other sources come up with (sometimes very) different numbers.

There was talk that Delfino actually got paid about 9-10 mio dollars last year by his russian team, they also paid Garbajosa 3 mio Euros a year who is now at Real Madrid.

So if you factor in taxes (right about 45-50%, right ?) you can see the allure for players getting 3-5 mio dollar contracts (1.1-2.4 in Euros post taxes), but a guy like Ginobili certainly wouldn´t make that move for the money and wouldn´t be paid more in Europe than in the US, especially factoring in that he propably makes more in endorsements in the US.

Thanks for the information.

The big Greek teams are big spenders compared to the rest of the teams you found info on. Out of curiosity I tried to find out what Ricky Rubio makes but a brief search was unsuccessful.

Rubio is apparently earning 1M€ before taxes (so around 700-800k€ post taxes).

can´t help you there sorry. Numbers i´ve come across over the past few months ranged from as low as 600-800 K to as high as 1.5 mio Euros , no idea what´s correct here really. It´s just all a bit more complicated with no one controlling entity like the NBA in the US.

Propably right in between those numbers at a little over 1 mio. Even with the buyout propably not a money decicion afterall (in terms of earning money, not in terms of not loosing money) unless he really does wait until 2012, when by my knowledge he won´t be limited by the rookie scale and can sign at least for the full midlevel with Minnesota unless they have cap space or trade his rights to a team that has cap space that summer.

The greek teams possibly won´t keep that up seeing that the greek economy has totally imploded in recent months and is waist deep in the shit as of now.
But i don´t know enough about the greek teams really, just guessing.

One other advantage, at least from what I've gathered, is that most of those teams cover your housing and living costs (not slum like living either)

One other quick note: Rubio cost himself MILLIONS with his decision to go to Europe rather than buy himself out. I've heard his family and others put huge pressure on him to stay as well as his want to go to a NY instead of Minnesota. . . but he's going to push back his unrestricted FA back. It was a really poor move if you just look at the dollar value of it.