It brings to mind all the hoops a political candidate jumps through for years, then finally wins, settles into his seat and turns to his chief of staff and says, “Now what do I do?"
Provided he has full autonomy as promised from mercurial owner Jim Dolan, Walsh should be able to do enough to return the Knicks to NBA relevancy.
Again, assuming that is the case, they'll find somewhere to stash coach and outgoing president Isiah Thomas, whether it be a personnel job or if they just put him on the shelf with all the other fired Knicks coaches that get overpaid long after they've been put out to pasture.
The biggest question is how much more money is Dolan going to eat?
Does Walsh bring in Scott Skiles or Mark Jackson to coach and see if they are capable of dealing with Stephon Marbury, or does Dolan choke on that oversized deal as well? And speaking of oversized, there is the status of big boys Eddy Curry and Zach Randolph – two talents that have yet to prove capable of performing as professionals (either on or off the court) on a daily basis.
Those are the first orders of business for Walsh as he moves forward. He hired and fired Thomas with the Pacers, so this shouldn't be such a huge problem considering they have a professional relationship one way or the other.
Regardless, the Bronx-born Walsh is a great pick for the job if it is tenable for anyone. He has rebuilt Pacers teams on the fly and kept them competitive in the process. They were continuously in the playoffs and Eastern Conference contenders until the 2004 brawl against Pistons fans derailed what looked like a championship season, then Larry Bird joined him in the front office.
Now that he's on his own again, success should be inevitable because there is talent on the Knicks roster and he is a super evaluator. It just doesn't fit right now. It will take a new coach. It will take moving out the old, tired head cases that are Marbury, Curry and Quentin Richardson … among others. Dump the damaged goods and replace them with new energy.
The Knicks have been toxic since Jeff Van Gundy walked out as coach in December of 2001. Walsh can be the antidote, but it's going to take time and it won't happen tomorrow, next week, next month or even next season.
But it will happen.
What we don't know is how patient the Knicks fans and media will be until it does.
This is going to get interesting once the dust settles -- from Indianapolis to New York City -- as Donnie Walsh moves from the city where he developed an elite reputation with the Pacers to his hometown where the Knicks are in ruins.
But he met with Knicks owner Jim Dolan last week, and the rumors have been rampant ever since based on the obvious situation in Indy -- either the 67-year-old CEO or Larry Bird, the 51-year-old president, had to go.
The latest thought was that Walsh turned down the Knicks and Bird was on his way out.
That’s why Pacers owner Herb Simon cleared the air Monday.
“I think everyone was getting confused,” Simon said. “There were a lot of rumors and we just thought if this was something that was really going to happen and once I was convinced Donnie was really leaving, I thought it would just be best to let everyone else know.”
Although they all said he would finish the season or stay "until they throw me out," as Walsh cracked wise. Most of it is contingent on the Knicks, despite Walsh’s refusal to comment on the reports that have him already coming to an agreement on a contract.
“I'm not commenting on anything that I'm going to do in the future because I'm unclear about it,” Walsh said. “And I'm just not going to comment on it until the time is right.”
That could be right around the corner, but we’ll get back to that later. Right now, we’re trying to figure out what went wrong here. We just don’t know whether it was Bird making the bad personnel decisions or Walsh. Or maybe it was simply the problem of having two people making the decisions instead of one.
Actually, everyone has been confused about the Pacers for quite some time, with the timing of their precipitous fall from grace in the East coinciding with their notorious brawl in the Palace of Auburn Hills with Pistons fans in November of 2004.
Since then, they have gone straight downhill. From being a model of NBA success in the glorious basketball heartland of Indiana in their perpetually sold out state-of-the-art Conseco Fieldhouse on their way to six conference finals under Walsh to the unequivocal decline the past four years. They failed to make the playoffs last season for the first time in a decade, have the worst attendance in the NBA and are on the brink of missing the postseason for the second year in a row – something that hasn’t happened here in nearly 20 years.
Maybe it’s just a coincidence that Bird took his present post five years ago, maybe not. Nonetheless, the perception of the Pacers as bad guys – from Ron Artest and Stephen Jackson to Jamaal Tinsley, Marquis Daniels and Shawne Williams – hasn’t gone away, and that combined with failure on the court has fractured the fan base. Walsh had said all along this would be his final season, but nobody believed him until now.
At least now we'll know who is making all the calls. And to this point, it would be fair to say nobody has been impressed with anything Bird has done in the front office.
“I think that's maybe one of the side benefits of clarifying the situation, having Larry's voice being the only voice,” Simon insisted. “Some people got confused. I liked having both of them but I think we're going to do very well with Larry.”
We’ll see. Walsh set up Bird with this job five years ago with the intention of him taking over completely one day, but nobody expected it to be under these circumstances. The Pacers had been too stable. Now they’re not.
“It's sad to see him go,” Bird said. “ I know there's a lot of speculation out there about whether he's going to stay or go but from day one he told me exactly what he was going to do and today, you always know it's coming but when it does happen you have different emotions and different feelings about it.
“We've talked about this before and I've always said that one voice is what you have, no matter if it's business or basketball. Learning this position through Donnie, there was a lot of confusion out there but now that he's stepping down I have no doubts in my ability to lead and do the things necessary to get this team back to the elite level.”
That has yet to be proven. On the court, Bird controlled his team's performance. He hasn’t shown the ability to build a successful team yet, and until then it’s ludicrous to compare Bird the player to Bird the president.
We already know what his predecessor has done, and now, unless a lot of people are sadly mistaken, it’s on to New York for Walsh. And it is home. Walsh grew up in the Bronx, played ball for Frank McGuire at South Carolina and cut his teeth coaching with Dean Smith and Larry Brown under McGuire. He earned his law degree, and once he moved from assistant coach to president of the Pacers in 1986, things quickly changed. The only thing that didn’t work was a meek attempt at changing his name from “Donnie” to “Don” as president of the organization. Included on his resume is an Eastern Conference title in 2000 before losing to the Lakers. There's also six trips to the conference finals and four division championships.
Everything else flowed until 2004.
But he’s a natural hire for New York. He’s proven to be a master of the salary cap, capable of rebuilding a team while still competing in the playoffs. One of those periods came with present Knicks president and coach Isiah Thomas as the Pacers coach, which is why this appears to be inevitable. Whether Thomas would stay on as coach or not depends on Dolan since Thomas is still owed so much money in the wake of an extension given last season. On the other hand, he has eaten the huge contracts of Lenny Wilkens and Larry Brown, so that may not be a factor in Dolan's decision.
Regardless, it will be up to Walsh to clean up this mess of a franchise that is presently 19-51 and hasn’t won a playoff series since 2005. They are light years over the salary cap and into luxury tax as the highest salaried team in the NBA. So Walsh will have his work cut out for him – perhaps to hire a new coach in the process – maybe even former Pacer and Knick and present broadcast analyst Mark Jackson.
Reports of Walsh accepting a three-year, $15 million deal from the Knicks are creating a positive buzz in New York. Consider these words of wisdom as we watch what happens.
“The league is its own life form in a way,” Walsh said in part on Monday. “It kind of evolves the way it evolves.”
Or devolves, as both the Knicks and Pacers have done in recent years … and as a byproduct, nobody is better prepared for New York than Donnie Walsh.
The NBA trade deadline passed last week and it was just another excuse for the wolves to resume howling in New York. Not that they need an excuse to go after the woeful Knicks or beleaguered coach, president and primary punching bag Isiah Thomas.
When somebody is failing to the extreme Thomas has in his role atop the Knicks, he will be a target until he is fired. Presumably the same will be true for managing partner Jim Dolan, until he is relieved of his duties.
But the exercise today is to explain why there is a brilliant man residing just 19 miles from New York without a full-time job, steeped in Knicks history, who is perfect for the job. He’s even chief outside advisor for McKinsey and Co., the management consulting firm that helps the upper-management of corporations solve their problems.
You’ll recognize the name … Bill Bradley.
You know him now as the ex-presidential candidate of 2000, former New Jersey senator and author of the book released last year, “The New American Story.”
So why in the world would this Rhodes Scholar and influential politician bother?
His jersey is hanging from Madison Square Garden, acknowledging his role in the Knicks’ NBA championships in 1970 and 1973, he spent the first 33 years of his life possessed by the game and, even at the age of 64, he can’t be that far removed emotionally from the roundball.
He roommate and best friend during his 10-year NBA career – all with the Knicks – was Phil Jackson, who worked diligently to help Bradley’s presidential campaign. And even though Jackson recently signed an extension to stay with the Lakers through the 2009-10 season, it wouldn’t be much of a stretch to imagine the wheels turning for Bradley to lure Jackson to the Knicks – and pay whatever it takes.
For all the complaints about Thomas’ lack of integrity and vision toward building the team, Bradley is beyond reproach. He was a Rhodes Scholar from Princeton after he was a three-year All-American who became the first basketball player to ever win the prestigious Sullivan Award as the nation’s top amateur athlete. Of course, he then was the key player on the 1964 gold medal-winning Olympic team … all of this before Thomas was through kindergarten.
Heck, he even went to Italy for a year before returning to the States from his Rhodes Scholar experience in Oxford, and played for Olympia Milano. Yes, they won the illustrious European Champions Cup that year.
Indeed, he struggled his rookie year with the Knicks in 1967, not quick enough to play shooting guard on his 6-5 frame, so coach Red Holzman slid him over to small forward his second season and it was in his third season they won their first title. For eight consecutive seasons he averaged double-figures and missed just 26 games during that time. Sure, Walt Frazier and Willis Reed were the stars of the team, and Dave DeBusschere to a slightly lesser degree. Earl Monroe earned a lot more fanfare when he joined the team for the 1973 championship run as well … after all, “The Pearl” dazzled everyone.
But Bradley was the rock. He always made the extra pass (utilizing his extraordinary peripheral vision), played the passing lanes with amazing skill, and hit the open jumper. There was a reason why he always hit the shot, and not just because he spent hours honing that touch from the perimeter growing up.
He wouldn’t shoot the ball unless he was open.
As great a player as Thomas was, unquestionably more physically talented than Bradley, he forced shots throughout his career.
Therein lies the difference between the two, and why Bradley would find success as president of the Knicks where Thomas is lost in the wilderness of forcing wild shots.
Precision.
It makes plenty of sense why former Phoenix Suns architect Jerry Colangelo’s name keeps coming up as the successor to Thomas. No doubt, he would do a fine job and help get them back on their feet.
But this is different. Bradley is intellectually and emotionally tied to the Knicks for life. Frazier, who has been doing broadcast analysis for years on the Knicks network, can barely stand watching what happens on the bench, let alone on the floor and in the locker room.
You don’t think he would drive down to Verona and plead the case to Bradley? Remember, it was “Clyde” who fed “Dollar Bill.”
It’s a natural. He is innately qualified for the position. And, shoot, he doesn’t even have a full-time job. All these other companies and causes are gleaning his brilliance for their own benefit. To be sure, he’s all about the greater good. His presidential candidacy in 2000 was steeped in giving scholarships to those who went into education, providing work for the indigent and helping reconstruct this country.
Well, he wasn’t into the game-playing and pretentious behavior it required to become president of the United States. He’s perfectly suited to be president of the New York Knicks. It’s time.
“Dollar Bill,” you are being paged.
So once again, as the Knicks return to prominence, just imagine the excitement in MSG after each win, and the final word over the public address system, “That was Bill Bradley.”
We're at mid-season in the NBA, and there are some surprises, disappointments, but nothing extraordinary as we consider what will happen during the final 41 games of the 2007-08 campaign.
As anticipated from their super-deals of the offseason, the Boston Celtics have taken off in the Eastern Conference with Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen joining forces with Paul Pierce, while showing the value of young point guard Rajon Rondo. They've got the best record in the East, ahead of the Detroit Pistons, while the Phoenix Suns are a nose ahead in the West, with the Dallas Mavericks and upstart New Orleans Hornets just a game behind them.
We figured the New York Knicks would be a mess this season too, but nobody believed it could deteriorate this much for Isiah Thomas – with a staged boycott featuring a giant pink slip to be signed by owner Jim Dolan as the featured attraction.
But nobody could have figured the Miami Heat and Chicago Bulls to be the two worst teams in the East, by a considerable amount – with Bulls coach Scott Skiles the first coach fired this season.
Those are just some of the issues that highlight/lowlight 2007-08 thus far as we provide the review:
Most Valuable Player: Kobe Bryant, Lakers
After a nightmarish summer of demands and rebuttals, no trade was made and Bryant led his young team to the best record in the West until young center Andrew Bynum dislocated his knee. Now young swingman Trevor Ariza broke his foot. It's beginning to look like a rerun of last season. Nonetheless, Bryant has been at his spectacular best both individually and in unison with his teammates. Also considered were Kevin Garnett, Dwight Howard and LeBron James.
Least Valuable Player: Stephon Marbury, Knicks
Wherever he's been the team is worse than when he got there. He is so gifted and so overpaid and so strange, it's hard to fathom what he is anymore. The general consensus is one-part point guard, one-part shooting guard, one-part sideshow, which leaves only two other spots on the floor. Nobody else is even close.
Best coach: Nate McMillan, Trail Blazers
McMillan has taken the youngest team in the NBA that won 53 games combined over the last two seasons, lost No. 1 overall pick Greg Oden before the season, has them just a half-game out of first in the Northwest Division. Even so, he's hardly a clear cut-choice over Hornets coach Byron Scott or the Celtics' Doc Rivers, with Washington's Eddie Jordan also a worthy candidate.
Worst combo exec-coach: Pat Riley, Heat
For the second time in this decade, it appears Riley the president has just about killed Riley the coach. With the rapid physical decline of Shaquille O'Neal, off-season surgery for Dwyane Wade and the remaining roster filled with some promising youth, but mostly marginal players, they are stunningly bad. If anything else happens to O'Neal or Wade, they're going to rival the Dolphins, or the Marlins … can't remember which team was worse.
Best rookie: Kevin Durant, Seattle Sonics
With no Oden, the wondrously gifted Durant appeared to be a lock for this, but no longer. Oh, he's still easily the best scoring rookie, but that's only because he's on an awful team and has the green light to shoot and shoot and shoot. The coaching staff has done little to develop him and his skinny frame is tired. Atlanta's Al Horford is gaining ground on him rapidly, though, and Yi Jianlian has come along much faster than many believed. As for the older crowd, I'll give some props for Jamario Moon, for fighting his way from nowhere at the age of 27 to become a significant factor for the Raptors. But I'm not jumping on the Juan Carlos Navarro bandwagon, not only because the Grizzlies are awful, but because he's a 10-year veteran from Barcelona –one of the great leagues in the world.
Disappointing rookie: Corey Brewer, Timberwolves
Joining Horford and Joakim Noah as one of three top 10 picks from the two-time champion Florida Gators, nobody questioned Brewer's athleticism. But his shooting, well, it appears he finally got it above 30 percent – even to 35 percent. But on a bad team like this, they needed a lot more than that from the seventh overall pick. Actually Noah isn't that far behind in the disappointment category, even being voted a two-game suspension by his teammates for mouthing off at assistant coach Ron Adams. But I still expect Noah to have a significant second half.
Best executive: Danny Ainge, Celtics
Considered by many to be gathering players to compete in the Big East as opposed the Atlantic Division, Ainge and his insistence on trying to discover high school superstars were widely thought to be, well, nuts. But the lack of success created this off-season monster with the additions of Garnett and Allen. He's still the easy winner, but the gutted roster has little wiggle room if injuries strike as they have Rondo.
Worst executive: Kevin McHale, Timberwolves
Just as easy as picking Ainge was the selection of his old buddy McHale on the flip side. Handing over one of the great players in the era in Garnett for practically nothing, McHale now has put together such a horrible team, they are serious contenders for the all-time record of just nine wins set by the 1972-73 Sixers.
Best defensive player: Marcus Camby, Nuggets
Not only is Camby leading the league in blocks at 4.0 a game, he's also averaging 14.3 rebounds. Twice this season he has recorded double-figures in blocks this season. Over the past 10 games, he's averaging 14.7 rebounds and 5.0 blocks, including last week's gem of 11 blocks, 24 rebounds and 2 steals in a key win over Utah.
Worst defensive player; Antoine Walker, Timberwolves
It's so sad to see guys with talent like this just float from team to team making so many millions of dollars to underachieve. That's what makes times like these so special – when they can recognized with such dubious distinction.
Best sixth man: Manu Ginobili, Spurs
The value of Ginobili as the sixth man of the Spurs can only be quantified as a left-handed version of what Hall-of-Famer John Havlicek did for so many championship teams in Boston in the 1960s-70s. There is non-stop energy on both ends of the floor and clutch play that helps his team win the biggest of games. Leandro Barbosa is worthy of mention, but he's not really close.
Worst starter: Quentin Richardson, Knicks
Brought in to be a shooter for the Knicks, the 'Q' rating has bottomed out. In 38 starts he's shooting .329 from the field, .293 from 3-point range and .595 from the free throw line. There's no reason for him to be playing with so many interchangeable parts on that roster.
Most improved player: Chris Kaman, Clippers
While it would be easy to take someone more visible and focus on Dwight Howard's leap into superstardom or LaMarcus Aldridge's great year despite Greg Oden's absence, Kaman has moved himself into the upper-echelon of NBA centers. Despite injuries that have crushed the Clippers (Elton Brand and Shaun Livingston) and the breaking down of Sam Cassell, Kaman has gotten better and better. He's averaging 17.4 points, 13.8 rebounds and 3.1 blocks – all three career-highs. He's more than doubled his defensive rebounds per game and he's also a terrific passer.
Most deteriorated player: Jermaine O'Neal, Pacers
Although his numbers of 15.3 points, 7.3. rebounds and 2.2 blocks aren't bad, they do show how rapidly his once 20-point, 10-rebounds, 3-block stats have gone downhill from the 2004-05 season as O'Neal has gone from superstar billing to sometimes All-Star. He is damaged goods – shutting it down for at least the next couple of weeks and perhaps the entire season to rest his left knee. He's missed 89 games before this most recent announcement over the past 3½ seasons. Still only 29, O'Neal will average more than $21 million in salary over the next three seasons. They hung on to him way too long.
Surprise team: Hornets
Despite moving back and forth from Oklahoma City to New Orleans, with the league-low in attendance despite numerous giveaways, this team continues to improve behind the coaching of Byron Scott and the terrific young trio of Chris Paul, Tyson Chandler and David West. They don't have much depth, with Peja Stojakovic still so fragile and Morris Peterson inconsistent from the wings, but they are still battling with Dallas and San Antonio for first place in the toughest division of basketball in the world. Can they hang there? Also the Portland Trail Blazers and Washington Wizards deserve significant recognition.
Disappointing team: Bulls
For 10 years it's been tough for the Bulls, starting off the season with so many road games when the circus would come to town, but this year they became the circus. With contract offers spurned by Ben Gordon and Luol Deng, Scott Skiles' firing and all the pressure on John Paxson to make moves, they are slowly coming around with assistant Jim Boylan as the interim coach. But this never figured to be in the cards.
Best owner: Mark Cuban, Mavericks
Say what you want about him, he does whatever it takes for his team to win and gives them everything they need and much, much more just so they have the opportunity to succeed. He's as competitive as the players are, and mouthy, which makes him unpopular with so many. But so what? He doesn't care and they're winning at breakneck speed again.
Worst owner: Clay Bennett, SuperSonics
A tough situation was made worse when he bought the team prior to last season, and now they are in the throes of the worst two years in franchise history. He bought the team to move it Oklahoma City and he's torturing the fans and the city with horrible basketball so they'll let him go. The league should be ashamed of itself. He doesn't care about the team. He doesn't care about the fans. He just wants to take his ball and go home.
First team All-NBA
F-LeBron James, Cleveland Cavaliers F-Kevin Garnett, Boston Celtics C-Dwight Howard, Orlando Magic G-Kobe Bryant, Los Angeles Lakers G-Steve Nash, Phoenix Suns
Last team All-NBA
F-Antoine Walker, Minnesota Timberwolves F-Quentin Richardson, New York Knicks C-Kwame Brown, Los Angeles Lakers G-Charlie Bell, Milwaukee Bucks G-Sebastian Telfair, Minnesota Timberwolves
In case you haven’t noticed, the taste of whine has left the lips of Kobe Bryant, and nobody has breathed a word about why the Lakers still have Andrew Bynum at center.
Gee, wonder why?
Maybe it’s because they do have the fourth-best record in the Western Conference at 16-9, and Bynum averaging a double-double – 11.1 points, 10.0 rebounds (plus 2.1 blocks) – has something to do with it. Indeed, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s pupil is advancing now that he’s a mature 20-year-old.
Tuesday’s 103-91 win at Chicago was precisely the way this vintage of Lakers is most effective – which is not when Bryant scores 40 or more points. He had 18 points, 6 rebounds, 3 steals, 2 assists and a block. All five starters finished in double-figures, and Sasha Vujacic came off the bench to lead them with 19. Bynum, by the way, had his requisite 12 points, 10 rebounds, 4 rebounds and 3 assists.
At 15-9, the Lakers trail only San Antonio, Phoenix and Dallas in the West. And, no, Bryant is not going to get traded. In fact, what team would have a better record than 15-9 had said team emptied its talent coffers to acquire His Petulance? Instead, the Lakers are just getting better. With the return of Derek Fisher, a healthy Lamar Odom and the continued growth of Luke Walton and Jordan Farmar, they are the same kind of team that started off 26-13 last year until injuries nailed them. And, they’ve added Trevor Ariza and subtracted Smush Parker, a huge plus.
And the reason they’ll keep getting better is Bryant will learn to create more for the other guys, particularly Bynum, the player he mocked last year when the Lakers refused to give him up for Jason Kidd. Bynum has played basketball competitively for such a short time in his life, nobody has a clue how good he will be, except that he’s bright, talented and huge. Every organization would love to have an Andrew Bynum, and he has everything to do with why Phil Jackson signed a two-year extension.
Losing Walton and Odom last season killed the Lakers, who were never the same even when they returned. It’s a leap to say this team will win the West, but L.A. is better than the team that blew a 3-1 series lead to Phoenix in 2006. So it’s time to lay off Mitch Kupchak and let this thing develop … they’re in a great spot right now.
It would seem to be only a matter of time before Rod Thorn takes a stick of dynamite to the Nets roster, beginning with Kidd. It may explain why Lawrence Frank started Josh Boone and Sean Williams instead of Jason Collins and Malik Allen on Monday against Sacramento. It didn’t matter much considering the loss was their sixth in the last seventh games and the insidiousness of it all has mostly come at home – losing eight of 10. But it is time to take inventory on the progress of their young players, with perhaps the grayest area of all being where talented 7-footer Nenad Krstic is on his slip-sliding road to recovering from ACL surgery 11 months ago.
Give credit to Kings rookie coach Reggie Theus for hanging in there despite a revolving- door lineup that began with Ron Artest’s suspension, Mike Bibby’s hand injury and the season-long groin injury to Kevin Martin. President Geoff Petrie had the foresight to steal point guard Beno Udrih for nothing when the Timberwolves stupidly released him, and that makes Bibby more expendable than ever for a big deal when he’s healthy over the next month. This team isn’t going to challenge for the West, but they are a playoff contender in the big picture.
The Bulls have continued battling their way up from the depths of their 2-10 start, but it’s way too early to get excited about anything. They’re just 6-4 since. The key numbers to watch belong to Ben Gordon, who turned down that more-than-generous $50 million contract. They’ve split their past eight games and Gordon is averaging 13.3, while shooting .368 from the field, which won’t do on a team that has no post game and relies on his shooting streaks.
The familiar Wagging Tongue of Air was on hand to show his Charlotte Bobcats how it’s done during practice on Tuesday. Sure, it was fun for rookie coach Sam Vincent to dream what it would be like to have managing partner Michael Jordan at small forward in actual games to help his young Bobcats gain some level of consistency. But at 44, not even Jordan would dare try it again. And now that they’ve obtained Nazr Mohammed from the Pistons to relieve some pressure from Emeka Okafor in the post, they’re hoping to gain traction. But with the losses of Adam Morrison and Sean May for the season to knee surgery, the great expectations of point guard Raymond Felton have to come sooner than later. And because of their youth overall, he just hasn’t made the strides that Deron Williams and Chris Paul have.
When LeBron James scored 31 points in Monday’s win over the Bucks, not only did it end a skid of eight losses out of nine games for the Cavs, but it made him the youngest player in NBA history to reach 9,000 points. With all he’s accomplished already, James won’t turn 23 until Dec. 30. Sometimes you just have to let the gifts ride, and obviously he has the intellect and temperament to maximize it all. Whether the organization has the brains and temperament to maximize James is the bigger question.
Anybody who questioned whether Sam Mitchell deserved coach of the year in 2007 certainly has no case now. He’s done an even better job with the Raptors this season considering the injuries to Chris Bosh, T.J. Ford and Jorge Garbajosa, while Andrea Bargnani has struggled mightily in a sophomore slump. Because of the rebirth o####reen Monster in Boston, they won’t repeat as Atlantic Division champs, but they’ll be even better come playoff time.
Nene will return to Nuggets practice this week after suffering torn thumb ligaments in Boston early last month. He’s played in only five games and the Nuggets can certainly use the help up front. But it’s hard to get excited about him coming back without wondering what the next malady will be. After missing only seven games his first two seasons, he’s played in only 125 of a possible 270 games. That’s some kind of gamble they made signing him to a $60 million deal prior to last season.
How bad has it gotten in New York? A group of 15 Knicks fans reportedly will demonstrate their disapproval of Knicks president and coach Isiah Thomas on Wednesday with a giant pink slip for owner Jim Dolan to sign.
So much is being made about this battle within the battle – comparing third-year point guards Deron Williams and Chris Paul – that maybe we should slow down a little on both guys and let this play out.
It was easy to get excited about Williams coming into this season. He was spectacular as last season progressed, while Paul battled ankle problems a good portion of the season – validating the decision by the Utah Jazz select Williams third and leave Paul for the New Orleans at No. 4 in the 2005 draft.
After all, Williams averaged 29.5 points and 9.3 assists in his first four Western Conference finals games against the Spurs last season before tiring in Game 5 as the Jazz were eliminated. And he started the same way this season, but his recent numbers have been very curious. He’s averaged 14.8 points and 9.0 assists in the past five game while the Jazz are tumbling in the midst of having lost seven of eight. In the previous five, Williams was averaging 31.6 points and 8.8 assists.
Meanwhile, Paul has been the model of consistency over the last 10 games averaging 27.4 points and 8.6 assists while the Hornets have split those games. Essentially, this tells us it is just way too early to make any big-picture assessment on either player or team. The Jazz appear to be a strong team for the long run because Williams has All-Star Carlos Boozer as a sidekick, while Paul’s help has come from a variety of sources, none of whom are as prolific as Boozer to remove some of the heat.
But we are hungry for the fresh faces from teams other than ones we’ve been consumed with since the turn of the century. The Jazz and the Hornets – Williams and Paul – are worthy of our focus. But they’ve still got a lot to prove.
Speaking of familiar teams, the Suns and Spurs matched up Monday night in a tight one, and the Suns became the first team to beat the Spurs at home in a 100-95 win. It was only the second game back for Spurs star Tim Duncan, who had missed two weeks with an ankle sprain, but he still had a monster game with 36 points and 17 rebounds. He even made it tough on Amare Stoudemire, who had the sub-par numbers of 17 points and 6 rebounds. And even with Tony Parker out for the Spurs with an ankle problem of his own, the Spurs held Steve Nash in check for the most part with just 10 points and 10 assists against the less-than-imposing Jacque Vaughn.
More interesting is the guy who had the clutch 22 points for the Suns – one ankle-challenged Grant Hill. It’s so easy to forget the Suns got him, and how badly he wants to win a title at the age of 35, but the reality is he’s averaging 15.9 points, 4.7 rebounds and 3.6 assists and has failed to reach double-figures in scoring only twice this season. With so much hand-wringing going on lately in the Valley of the Sun over the lack of toughness inside and defense, they are 18-7 and trail the Spurs by just a half-game for the best record in the West.
And as for the lack of toughness inside and defense, what else is new? They haven’t had it the past three seasons as they’ve gotten closer and closer to winning the West. And while the 6-8 Hill is another finesse player, he has special qualities that could supersede the five ankle surgeries in four years that nearly crippled him. It’s way too soon to give up on Hill or the Suns, whose new general manager Steve Kerr is itching to put the final piece of the puzzle together. (How would the Pacers’ Jermaine O’Neal fit in a three-way deal with the Knicks?)
While we’ve brought up the Pacers, how about the game Mike Dunleavy put together at Madison Square Garden Monday night – a career-high 36 points, 7 rebounds and 4 assists in a 27-point blowout of the Knicks. It’s particularly impressive considering he had just 6 points, 4 assists and 1 rebound at Miami in a tight win on Saturday. Just as people are about to write off Dunleavy, this is easily his best season. At 27, it is about time he matured enough to consistently produce on a nightly basis because he is so gifted in myriad ways. With 22 points in the third quarter alone, he was just the latest opposing player to incite the caustic MSG crowd into taunting their once-beloved Knicks.
For the first time in this nightmarish season, Knicks coach and president Isiah Thomas blasted the heart and pride of his team, and it came upon the return of mercurial point guard Stephon Marbury, who had been away from the team following the death of his father. The only real issue right now is when owner Jim Dolan finally concedes this team has quit on Thomas. Everybody else knows they have. He’s just being the stubborn cowboy he’s always been, and you would think since he loves the Knicks so much he’d realize they have no chance to win as long as Thomas is running the team. Then again, who can be surprised considering Dolan is the one that got them into this mess in the first place.
We can’t help but wonder about the way suspensions are being meted out these days. Atlanta forward Al Horford’s head shot on T.J. Ford putting in question the rest of Raptors point guard’s career, while the errant elbow of Nuggets forward Kenyon Martin will require a two-month recovery period for the shattered left eye socket of Hornets forward Melvin Ely. Typically, the punishment is based on intent, and it is obvious neither Horford nor Martin meant to cause some damage. Horford, knowing Ford already has a serious issue with narrowing of the spinal column, spent much of the night at the hospital with Ford. And Martin immediately attended to Ely with apologies.
But the movements that caused the injuries were purposeful. And once again, how do these guys get the same one-game slap as Amare Stoudemire and Boris Diaw for getting up off the bench in last year’s playoffs? Causing possible career-ending injury compared to marginally breaking a rule? You make the call.
It’s hard to fathom that Hawks forward Shelden Williams was the victim of carjacking outside a barber shop over the weekend, but here we go again. Has it gotten to the point that all professional athletes and entertainers must have bodyguards?
The Blazers extended their winning streak to eight games for the first time in five years, and at 13-12 are now just a 1.5 games behind the first-place Nuggets in the Northwest Division … really. Not only have they done this after losing top pick Greg Oden to knee surgery, but having dealt leading scorer and rebounder Zach Randolph for marginal Channing Frye, who now is making an impact. Besides, LaMarcus Aldridge hasn’t even played the past five games with plantar fasciitis. With Brandon Roy flourishing, Travis Outlaw coming of age, and the defense toughening every night, it’s obvious that general manager Kevin Pritchard has succeeded in building a team that perfectly suits the tough, defensive-oriented style of coach Nate McMillan.
The Dallas Mavericks are beginning to gain steam, and struggling star Dirk Nowitzki had a breakout game with 31 points and 11 rebounds, as the Mavs edged the Magic by three. It’s the first time in three weeks Dirk has had at least 20 points in two games in a row, as the Mavs now have won five of six. Watch out, Spurs … here they come again.
