Second Half Spurs

I don't really have time to post much tonight, got a busy week, but I just wanted to talk about the Spurs (what else is new?) for a second. They are now on a six game winning streak and are playing their best basketball of the season at the time they usually start to pick it up going into the playoffs.

The Spurs have always been a second half team and this year appears to be no different. I have believed throughout the year that the Spurs have been coasting through the season for the most part, even though I have been concerned with the way they have been playing, and are only getting ready for the playoffs. I think it's a safe bet to assume the road to the Finals in the west goes through San Antonio, again.

Something To Look Forward To?

The general attitude around the league today is not very good. With a trade deadline that had so much promise to be interesting a dud and the passing yesterday of Celtics great Dennis Johnson, today isn't the best day the NBA's had.

A lot of people were hoping that their teams would make a move or two to put themselves in better position to make a push for or through the playoffs, but for the most part there was disappointment.

Of the three deals that went down yesterday, none put a team in any better position. In my opinion, the only teams who the trade deadline really helped yesterday were the top teams. They don't have to worry about another team instantly getting better based on one move.

That means there probably won't be a lot of surprises the rest of the way. A coaching change could spark a team like it did for the Nuggets two seasons ago when they hired George Karl and went 32-8 the rest of the season. They eventually lost to the Spurs in the first round of the playoffs (the Spurs by the way went on to win the title that year).

And of course some teams could put together the pieces that they have a find a groove, much like the Nuggets have the potential to do this year with Carmelo Anthony and Allen Iverson playing together and even the Warriors with the new players the acquired after the 8 player trade earlier this season. These teams could find a rhythm and raise hell in the playoffs.

I expect things to stay pretty much the same the rest of the way though. The playoffs are where things are going to change, but until then, just enjoy what you see. R.I.P. Dennis Johnson.

Blogging the Trade Deadline

I'm going to try something new today. Since I'm here in my recliner in my living room watching the latest news on the trade deadline, I thought I'd live blog everything going on. So here we go:

12:09 - Stephen A. Smith is on Cold Pizza right now talking about the latest news. To sum up what he's saying, not much is going on.

12:11 - ESPN.com already has the news that the Hawks picked up Anthony Johnson from the Mavs for this summer's second round pick. Also, Portland has agreed to send Juan Dixon to the Raptors for Freddie Jones.

12:15 - Just read this from Chad Ford's live chat: Just talked to Kidd's agent, Jeff Schwartz, on my Daily Dish podcast. You can listen to the link from the ESPN.com NBA front page. He's saying that Kidd will be wearing a Nets uniform tomorrow. Sorry Laker fans.

12:26 - Because ESPN won't give me any special coverage of the trade deadline, I'm forced to scour the Internet for news. Not that that's a bad thing, I just don't like watching Cold Pizza. Thanks ESPN!

12:40 - No new news, and no television coverage, so I'm popping in Gangs of New York.

12:52 - It looks like Mike James is really close to going to Houston. Apparently for Bob Sura. I hope there's a draft pick involved in there somewhere.

1:00 - An hour until the deadline, and other than the two deals mentioned earlier, nothing else is official. Apparently the Cavs are still going hard after Mike Bibby and the Lakers are still trying to find a way to get Kidd without giving up Andrew Bynum.

1:16 - Nothing. I wish I had phone lines to work, but I don't.

1:36 - Still nothing. This has the potential to be one of the worst trade deadlines ever. Which is a shame because so many big names have been mentioned in the days leading up to today.

1:48 - About 10 minutes to go and Yahoo! says Bibby won't be traded, nor Pau Gasol.

2:01 - Trade deadline has passed. We'll find out in the next ten minutes if any deals went down right at the wire.

2:19 - Nothing. I would imagine that if any deals went down at the deadline, they would've been announced by now. I think I can call it a day. Hopefully next year there will be more activity.

A Couple More Things

Before I forget, there are a couple more things I want to talk about.

First, why is ESPN, on the day of the trade deadline in the NBA, having no special coverage about it? Don't they do that during baseball's trade deadline? Football's trade deadline is of no importance, but basketball's is.

Why are they showing NFL Live at three in the afternoon tomorrow, the exact time of the trade deadline? At a time when the NFL season is over and there is nothing going on, they're going to devote a half hour to talking about NFL news!

Instead they could be having some sort of half hour to hour long NBA special featuring any number for their talking heads discussing the trade deadline. Give me something! This is why the NBA is horrible at NBA coverage and should never be allowed to broadcast another game. Ever. David Stern should be ripping up that contract the NBA signed with ESPN and giving NBC their coverage back.

Second, I read somewhere that Pat "Nagaina" Riley admitted that he wouldn't have taken a leave of absence from the team if they had been playing better. What?!?!?!?!?!?!?! Are you serious? I'm not sure if this is true, but I'm going to look into it.

If it is, I will no longer have any respect for him. Ever. I don't care how many NBA championships you have, you don't quit on your team only to come back and try and steal the glory for yourself. Trust me, there's more to come on this.

Christmas in February

That's what the trade deadline is like. For someone who has more fun simulating seasons and doing all the offseason stuff in the Franchise mode of the Madden games, the trade deadline gets me all hot and bothered. Just kidding. Sort of.

I'm seriously considering skipping my 12:30 political science class tomorrow in order to keep track on all the goings on in the NBA, even though I have a five page paper due.

Do I know who's going to be moved and to where? Nope, I don't. I still the think the Beno Udrih to the Cavs for Anderson Varejao trade should happen. But I've also been hearing for quite a while from a friend who works for the Spurs a trade involving Udrih and Brent Barry to the Clippers for Corey Maggette.

Odds are neither of them happen, but it's still fun to discuss and think about what your team would be like if one of these moves happen. It's part of being a fan. Let's hope something interesting happens.

Now about that political science paper....

Fixing The Spurs

With the Spurs sitting in fourth place in the Western Conference right now and the Mavericks continuing to distance themselves in the Southwest Division, the Spurs need to do something by Thursday's trade deadline if they are going to challenge the Mavs and the Suns.

The Spurs obviously want to trade Beno Udrih. He's a very talented player, but Gregg Popovich is not happy with his toughness. I read a rumor this morning that the Cleveland Cavaliers are interested in Udrih.

It would make sense for the Cavs because of their lack of consistency at the point guard position. Eric Snow is aging rapidly and can't shoot and Daniel Gibson is still just an inexperienced rookie. Trading for Udrih would give them a solid point guard going into the playoffs.

Who would the Spurs get in return? If the Spurs are going to trade Udrih to the Cavs, they'd better get Anderson Varejao in return. Varejao is just 24 years old and provides a nice spark off the bench much like Manu Ginobili is currently doing.

His youth and energy would provide the perfect change of pace for when Tim Duncan comes out of the game. Robert Horry just doesn't have the legs that he used to and would be better suited to playing more limited minutes until playoff time.

The only problem with Varejao coming to the Spurs would be how he would fit in when Matt Bonner comes back from injury. But his athleticism and energy would be perfect coming off the bench for the Spurs and he would be the best defender they could throw at Dirk Nowitzki outside of Bruce Bowen in the playoffs.

For the sake of all Spurs fans out there R.C. Buford, make it happen. ESPN's Trade Machine says it would work.

Tired, So Tired

Yeah, I'm exhausted, and I didn't even go to Vegas. Unfortunately. The worst part about not going to Vegas for the All-Star game is reading everybody's stories on what they did in Vegas. It almost hurts inside. Basically, I really wish I went to Vegas this weekend. I really, really wish I went to Vegas this weekend.

It's probably a good thing though. Because I didn't have a wild weekend and I'm still dragging. I'm really not sure why I'm posting anything tonight, because the truth of the matter is there is not much going on today. ESPN and SLAM and everyone else has their recaps of All-Star weekend and their previews of the final third of the regular season. Me? I don't know what I have. Maybe I should just do a combination of the both.

I'll just say that the actual game was pretty lame. The Slam Dunk Contest was decent but could've been better. I missed Chuck vs. Dick but caught it on YouTube tonight. That, along with the East practice featuring the dance-off between Shaq, LeBron and Dwight(He deserves to go by just one name by now right?), and pretty much anything Gilbert Arenas did this weekend were definitely the highlights.

So where do we go from here? Eventually, the playoffs. First we've got the trade deadline coming up on Thursday, which is intriguing considering there are some big names being thrown around like Pau Gasol, Jason Kidd and to a lesser extent, Kevin Garnett.

But I would really be surprised to see any of those guys moved especially considering some of what is being offered in return for some of them. To put it this way, I could give the Nets more for Kidd than what I've heard is being offered for him.

Plus with his personal baggage that's being thrown around in the media right now and the fact that the Nets will get a (potentially) healthy Richard Jefferson in a few weeks, I'd be surprised to see him moved.

But then again, I have absolutely no sources whatsoever. I'm just thinking out loud, er, online. Anyway, I expect the trade deadline to be like the All-Star game, a lot of hype but in the end nothing special. I hope I'm wrong.

We'll start to see which teams turn it on to close out the season and which teams start to fade away. I'm wondering if the Mavericks are going to start to get burnt out. I haven't been keeping track of how Avery Johnson has been taking care of his main guys' minutes, but it's something to definitely keep an eye on.

What I'm coming to is that the rest of the way out is where things get really interesting. I expect to be up late many nights the rest of the season trying to say up and catch the west coast games. Especially since now TNT will be showing Tuesday games along with their usual Thursday lineup. The games start up again tomorrow.

All-Star Game Notes, 2nd Half

Here's the second half notes:

• Halftime show: What's with having people all around the stage on the floor. They do that for the Super Bowl halftime show too. We should just ban halftime shows. Or I could just turn the channel. Too lazy.

• Second half starts up. Finally.

• Amare Stoudemire with a backwards layup. Don't wanna say reverse because it wasn't, he was just backwards.

• TNT shows a graphic saying Eddie Jordan is a native Washingtonian. Don't know how to respond to that one.

• Craig Sager is doing some sort of Jeep Wrangler commercial/promo thing. Why is the Jeep black? Why can't it match his suit? That's just laziness on the part of Jeep.

• Gabrielle Union, SMOKING. Had to be in caps.

• Pick and roll with KOBE! and Amare, nice lob for the layup.

• Steve Kerr just said "fivesome." Hehe.

• Carmelo backing down Richard Hamilton. Hamilton keeps putting his hand on Melo's back and Melo keeps swatting it away. Reminds me of the beginning of Above The Rim where Shep is playing on the rooftop against Nutso. Can't wait for Rip to jump off the Thomas & Mack Center.

• Great pass from Chauncey Billups to Caron Butler, but Butler can't finish.

• Shawn Marion with a nice windmill dunk all alone. Full extension and he nailed the landing. 10's all around, even the Russian judge.
  

• These Sprite LeBron James subliminal message commercials are trippy. I think I need to bum some of those shrooms from the Gonzaga players to understand them.

• Milk carton: Defense.

• Eddie Jordan is upset with the East's defense? This is the same guy who coaches the Wizards right?

• While being interviewed by David Aldridge on the bench, Gilbert Arenas wonders aloud if Caron Butler can make a layup. As long as I wasn't the only one.

• 119-88 West after three. I'm starting to lose interest.

• Tony Parker on his wedding, "Eva's doing all the work, I'm just going to show up and say yes." Classic.

• Dwyane Wade spin, fade-away, off the glass. Sick.

• KOBE! still gunning for the MVP and I think he's got it.

• 4 minutes left and it's 140-117 West. This game's over. I can only hope for some nice highlights the rest of the way.

• That Nike Second Coming commercial still hasn't gotten old yet.

• KOBE! with an emphatic dunk to finish it off and put the MVP on lock. 152-132 West. Anticlimactic is an understatement.

• I think David Stern uses the phrase "One star that was brighter than them all" every year when he hands out the MVP.

That's the game. I'm tired, pretty not as tired as the people in Vegas, but tired nonetheless. I'm out.

All-Star Game Notes, 1st Half

Here's some notes on the first half of the NBA All-Star Game:

• Wes Unseld Jr. looks a bit like Chris Tucker.

• Starting lineups: Tim Duncan looks excited to be there

• KOBE! starts off the scoring

• Dwyane Wade answers back

• KOBE! with a nice dunk and Wade answers right back, finishing off an oop

• I hope Jason Kidd throws a cookie at someone during tonight's game.
  

• 6 minutes in and Dwight Howard throws down a big dunk, I'm kind of expecting him to have a David Lee like night with all his points coming on dunks.

  Next time down Howard misses a short jumper, whatever.

• Carmelo with the jumper, still my MVP pick. Everyone knows he should have been voted in as a starter and definitely should have been picked as a reserve, but it took the commish to get him on the roster. I think all the players on the west are going to make an effort to get him the ball so he can make a push for MVP.

• Lebron, air-ball, sit down.

• Memo Okur's goatee looks like a chinstrap.

• Vince Carter spins and dunks in the lane, nice, he should do that more often. Just one man's opinion though.

• Tony Parker with the short jumper over Dwight Howard, I'm surprised that didn't get swatted into the fourth or fifth row.

• 39-31 West after 1.

• That Dwyane wade Gatorade commercial with the heads over each of his shoulders is great. Just letting you know.

• Ray Allen, wet.

• Rip Hamilton streaking down the court gets a good pass from teammate Chauncey Billups for a dunk.

• Ray Allen, wet again.

• Shaq misses a dunk, gets it back, dunks it, then kisses Tracy McGrady on the side of the head. Literally. Seriously. Gotta love Shaq.

• The west is on fire from behind the arc in the second quarter

• Tony Parker brought his jumpshot with him to Vegas.

• Gotta love Marv Albert and Steve Kerr doing the game. Is there a better announcing team in all of sports?

• Nice give and go in transition between Carmelo and Tony Parker.

• Joe Johnson with a 3 with a minute left in the first half. Good to see him finally find his way on to the team, he deserves it. And I'm not just saying that because he's on my fantasy team. Or am I?

• 79-59 West at the half. KOBE! early front runner for MVP with 18 in the first half. Melo has 12.

Why The Dunk Contest Should Have More Than 4 Guys In It

Seriously, why are there only four guys participating in it? I know it would take longer, but is that really a bad thing? I guess only when it takes someone 10+ tries to finish a dunk.

I wish I could say that I watched all of All-Star Saturday Night, last night, but I didn't. Hadn't seen my sister and her boyfriend in about a month so family responsibilities took precedent. But I did catch the main events of the night though, thanks to Las Vegas traffic apparently.

From what I heard, the Detroit team won the Shooting Stars contest. Wouldn't know, didn't watch it. Unfortunately I missed Dwyane Wade winning the skills challenge. My pick Chris Paul didn't get it done for me.

I did get to catch the Three-Point Shootout and Slam Dunk Contest though. My selecting, Mike Miller, didn't make it out of the first round thanks to Dirk Nowitzki. Agent 0 Gilbert Arenas finished second to Jason Kapono. You'd think that I would pick the guy leading the NBA in three point field goal percentage to win the contest, but no, I over thought it and picked someone else.

The Slam Dunk Contest was where it was at last night though. Tyrus Thomas? Here's your $18,000 check and please go home.

I wholeheartedly believe Dwight Howard got the shaft. Jumping as high as he can and putting that specially made sticker on the backboard was genius. The actual dunk, I'll admit, wasn't that great, but the show he made out of it was great. That is why I love the dunk contest.

One of the things that I also liked about the contest was the judging. Even though Kobe Bryant and Vince Carter should be in the contest as dunkers, not judges, Having some hall of fame dunkers on the panel was great.

I especially liked how stingy the G.O.A.T. was with his scores. It seemed like every time he said, "I can do that, so you only get an 8." But I think he should've given Howard a better score for his second dunk.

Oh yeah, and I picked Gerald Green to win it. The only pick I've gotten right so far this weekend. Watch out for Carmelo tonight though. He's still my pick for MVP. I did hear and interesting theory on Tony Parker for MVP because of the lack of point guards for the West tonight.

Once again, TNT did a great job with the coverage the entire night. I'm near depression right now because I missed Charles Barkley's race with Dick Bavetta, but I'll get over it. Eventually.

Quote of the Night: "That was just like Grandma's Kool-Aid, cuz it was sweeeeeeeeet!" - Kenny Smith

My goal is to take notes on tonight's All-Star game and have them posted tonight or early tomorrow.

I Can Admit When I'm Wrong

While I was sitting here today thinking how awesome it would be if the NBA actually did raise the rim to 12 feet for tonight's Slam Dunk Contest for Dwight Howard, I was remembering back to something I said at the beginning of the season about Darko Milicic. It was a post I wrote as sort of a offseason recap/season preview. Anyway, here's a excerpt:

Darko will surprise many people with his play alongside Howard this season, and might even muster up some All-Star votes. That's right, you heard it here first, Darko Milicic will compete for an All-Star spot.

Oops, maybe I was wrong. Or maybe I was right. About the first part at least, or the middle part. I mean, he had to get at least a couple of votes right? His parents had to have voted for him right? His teammates? Perhaps a significant other? Either way, I was way off.

On The First Night

I was all ready to have a post done after the Rookie-Sophomore game finished last night. Then I got distracted for a moment and all of a sudden I was on my shift on-air at the radio station and I forgot all about doing the post. So I'm going to go ahead and do it first thing in the morning instead.

The sophomores beat the rookies in the Rookie-Sophomore game (just like I predicted!). David Lee won the MVP (not like I predicted!). Lee was 14 of 14 from the field in the game for 30 points, with all of them dunks or layups, and he had 11 rebounds and four assists.

As you could probably tell, defense was not at a premium in this game. I think it went on vacation for the weekend with all the players who didn't make it to All-Star.

As for my MVP pick Danny Granger? 17 points and four rebounds. A pretty good line, but when you consider the sophomores scored 155 points, it kind of diminishes it a bit.

The Rookie-Sophomore game is never really the highlight of All-Star weekend, but it's a good way to kick it off. Saturday is really the meat and potatoes of the weekend, with the Slam Dunk, Three Point, and Skills contests.

One last thing, it made me very happy that the only thing from All-Star weekend that ESPN got the rights to cover was the celebrity game. If you really think about it, it's pretty fitting that that's what ESPN gets to show.

Anyway, good stuff on tonight. I'll try to have another post late tonight or early tomorrow. Peace.

What Happens at All-Star Weekend...

All-Star Weekend is finally here. Unfortunately I'm not in Vegas this weekend covering everything. In due time though. So instead I'll be covering everything from the comfort of the recliner in my living room. Which is much better after all than dealing with all the raging parties, free giveaways from shoe companies, and seeing pretty much every currently relevant celebrity known to man. Isn't it? Oh, and I think there's a basketball game in there somewhere.

Irregardless, I will be breaking my vow to never do too much work on the weekend and will be covering everything I see and posting recaps and opinions on everything after it goes down. So make sure you check back throughout the weekend.

One last note, here are my predictions for everything during the weekend:

• Rookie-Sophomore Game Winner: Sophomores with Danny Granger as MVP
• Slam Dunk Contest Winner: Gerald Green, Boston Celtics
• Skills Challenge Winner: Chris Paul, New Orleans Hornets
• Three Point Shootout Winner: Mike Miller, Memphis Grizzlies
• Shooting Stars Contest Winners: No one cares.
• NBA All-Star Game Winner: West with Carmelo Anthony as MVP (Don't say I didn't warn you)

So those are my predictions and I look forward to being completely wrong on every single one of them. Enjoy the festivities.

Mid-Week Funk

Don't really have much motivation to write anything tonight. Well, not so much motivation as I just plain don't know what to write about. But I feel it's my duty to write something for the legions of fans logging on everyday to read this site. And by legions I mean my mom and dad. So today I'm just going to go through my random thoughts, mostly about the NBA:

• The All-Star break is coming up, and it's in America's playground, Las Vegas. I'm really curious as to who is going to be the first player to be arrested. Bets should not be taken though the second Stephen Jackson's flight lands in Vegas.
• This seems like the first year I can remember that by the time the game starts, nobody is going to be complaining about anybody being snubbed from either team. It might have something to do with about half of each original roster being injured and sitting out the game though, but I'm not sure.
• Today is day 7,533 of my life without NBA League Pass. Just thought you should know.
• The Celtics goal of tanking their season and winning the lottery is great and all, but it's really screwing with my fantasy season. Didn't they think that some people might be counting on Paul Pierce to help carry their team?
• Tim Hardaway? Dead to me. His Warriors teams of the early 90's will now be referred to as Run-BMC. The B standing for bigot.
• If I can't find a job as a sportswriter here in the States after I finish college, I might just go to Spain become a sportswriter there. Why you ask? Because I own the Spanish language, as the 93 I got on my Spanish 1 quiz would attest to.
• Is there an anti-steroid? Because if there is, Jerome James took the whole batch:
• Despite losing to the Spurs tonight, the Pistons are my pick to come out of the East.
• Pat Riley, you're a snake. And from now on, you will be referred to as Nagaina, the cobra from Rikki-Tikki-Tavi.

Just some random thoughts for today. I'll be back tomorrow with something a little more coherent. Hopefully.

I Love Thi$ Game

Some fuss has been made this week over the comments that Chicago Bulls rookie forward Tyrus Thomas made about participating in the Slam Dunk Contest. Thomas told reporters that he was "Just going to go out there, get my check and call it a day.'' He was also quoted as saying "I'm just into the free money. That's it. I'll just do whatever when I get out there.''

Thomas was fined $10,000 by the Bulls for his comments and he issued a statement apologizing for his comments saying that they came out the wrong way. But my question is this: Why are we so angry at someone for telling the truth?

Don't get me wrong, I don't agree with the philosophy that comes across in his comments one bit. But in a day where athletes and people never give straight answers to questions, why should we vilify someone for speaking the truth? Maybe that's the reason no one gives truthful answers to questions anymore, we don't want to hear the truth. They just tell us what we want to hear.

Tackling Thomas' argument that he's only in it for the money, what's so wrong with that? There are plenty of players in the NBA right now whose only motivation for playing is a paycheck (word to Tim Thomas). What's so wrong with a player admitting that the only reason they're doing something is for the money?

I'm not really sure. I'll be honest, I don't want the NBA to be full of players only playing for dollars. I want players to play because they love the game and they want to win. It makes the game better for everyone. But I do want the truth. I can handle it.

Back In the Swing of Things

The updates were kind of slow last week and over the weekend because I was fighting off a cold. And let me tell you, when I have a cold I have just the motivation required to do absolutely nothing. So in the words of Talib Kweli I was doing enough "just to get by."

And it's a shame that I didn't get some posts in last week that I wanted to. I watched the Cavs-Heat game and kept a close eye on a player who I played against in high school, Daniel Gibson, who has taken on a bigger role for the Cavs in the past couple weeks after Cavs coach Mike Brown decided to move Gibson into the starting lineup in favor of Eric Snow.

It happened to be Gibson's best game as a pro so far as he scored 19 points while shooting 4 of 6 from three-point range. The Cavs lost by three though.

Some big things are in the works for this blog in the coming months. I don't want to reveal much, but there are some huge things being planned. I'm very excited.

Change of Pace

It's not very often that I get to talk about social issues on this blog because this site primarily deals with basketball. But some big news (in my opinion) dropped this week because former NBA player John Amaechi is apparently announcing in his upcoming book Man In The Middle that he is gay.

ESPN is publishing the book, so they had the first story about Amaechi and his book. But also check out former SLAM Magazine editor Ryan Jones' take on it on SLAMonline.com. Jones went to college with Amaechi at Penn State and has his background info on Amaechi.

To me, this is one of those huge news stories in sports. I have a feeling it's going to get overshadowed in a few days by something of less importance, I'm not sure what, but something. And that's very unfortunate. This is big news.

But what the NBA, pro sports, and the America needs is for a current player in the NBA or one of the major sports to come out of the closet. Our country still has a problem with homosexuality and that is something that would help go a long way to making it more socially acceptable.

Why is that so? I'm not really sure, but sometimes sports has a way of doing that in our society. It goes back to the integration of sports a few decades ago. Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in baseball. Over the years, people became more tolerant of other races. No, it wasn't solely because of sports and yes, there is still racism today, but it is far less prevalent and sports definitely helped.

Someone can do that for homosexuality. Of course players back in the day couldn't hide their skin color like players today can hide their sexual preference. There have been homosexuals in the four major sports already, but all of them came out of the closet after their playing careers were finished.

I know it would be very, very difficult for someone to come out of the closet during their playing career. Players get heckled enough by fans on the road for other things, they get trash talked enough by other players, and hear tons of negative things from the media in sports radio, television and print media that it would practically be career suicide to come out.

But one of these days someone has got to make that sacrifice and help out the average homosexual citizens by coming out of the closet and making the country acknowledge that fact and say it's okay. Until then, nothing in this country is going to change people's attitudes and opinions.