basketball Page 209 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Brian Bowen's Dad Describes Black Market Payments For Top Recruits At Every Level Of "Amateur" Basketball
Brian Bowen’s dad testified Thursday in the federal criminal trial of agent Christian Dawkins, Adidas executive James Gatto, and former Adidas operative Merl Code, who are accused of committing felony wire fraud as part of the FBI’s massive investigation of corruption in basketball recruiting. Bowen...

J.R. Smith Will Give Fan $600 For Tossing His Phone Into Construction Site
Cavaliers guard J.R. Smith, who will be startled some time in late November when he realizes he has inbounded the ball to Collin Sexton and not LeBron James, will pay a fan $600 after hurling the man’s phone into a Manhattan construction zone in late July. ...

No One Involved In Putting Malik Monk Into Hornets Preseason Game Notices He Isn't Wearing A Jersey
Things like this will not help to defeat the perception that second-year Hornets guard Malik Monk is destined to settle in as a J.R. Smith/Nick Young-style NBA eccentric: ...

Maybe Kobe Bryant Didn't Flinch Because He Had No Reason To
On March 7, 2010, the Church of Kobestan found its holy sacrament in a Lakers-Magic regular-season game. Sports goblin Matt Barnes was inbounding the ball on the right sideline. He faked a pass directly into Kobe Bryant’s face and Kobe Bryant—he of the hyper-competitive, killer-instinct mentality, t...

<i>WWE Raw</i> Segment Goes Off The Rails When Seattle Crowd Won’t Stop Booing SuperSonics Joke
Denigrating the city in which an event is being held is one of the oldest and most reliable ways for a pro wrestler to get heat. It’s probably pretty cheap, honestly, but who cares. It’s easy to rip on a city’s sports teams, but there’s a reason wrestlers still do it: It generally works....

Ron Baker Sucked A Contact Lens And Then Put It Right In His Damn Eye<em></em>
Ron Baker played 17 mostly second-half minutes in Monday night’s Knicks preseason game, which went to overtime. It was in overtime, with just under a minute left, when Baker was whacked in the face by Wizards rookie Troy Brown and had his contact lens dislodged. Lacking a few drops of nice clean sal...

Markieff Morris's Bad Temper Is In Mid-Season Form
My friends, the Morris twins are extremely back on their bullshit. Last week Marcus Morris took the bait when Tristan Thompson ran his mouth about the LeBron-less Cavs still being the team to beat in the Eastern Conference. Also last week Markieff Morris felt it sensible to declare that the Boston C...

Report: Former NBA Try-Hard Chris Dudley Once Allegedly Smashed A Pint Glass On Someone's Head While Defending Brett Kavanaugh
Hopeless free-throw shooter and failed gubernatorial candidate Chris Dudley was pals and drinking buddies with Brett Kavanaugh when the two attended Yale together from 1983 to 1987. Where young Brett tried and failed to make the men’s basketball team, Dudley was the team’s star center and went on to...

Kyrie Irving Is Sorry For Ironically(?) Perpetuating The Flat Earth Theory
Boston Celtics guard Kyrie Irving has something of a confession: He was not totally serious about being a big-time flat Earth guy, even though he spent a lot of time playing the part of a fake-deep intellectual. At a panel today, Kyrie blamed an algorithm-fueled YouTube binge for his incorrect belie...

LeBron, In A Lakers Uniform, Doing LeBron Stuff
The Los Angeles Lakers opened their preseason last night in San Diego. Who cares! I don’t care. The NBA should shut up for at least another couple weeks. Did they win? Who were their opponents? Who led them in scoring? Don’t care!...

Wayde Sims, 20-Year-Old LSU Forward, Shot And Killed Near Southern University Campus
LSU junior forward Wayde Sims was shot near a neighboring university’s campus early Friday morning. The 20-year-old was taken to a local hospital where he died of his injuries, according to Baton Rouge Police....

The Jimmy Butler Trade Saga Has Entered The Realm Of Farce
For a team that reportedly doesn’t actually want to trade disgruntled star Jimmy Butler, the Minnesota Timberwolves sure seem intent on wasting everybody’s time. The Ringer’s Kevin O’Connor reported that Minnesota asked for Ben Simmons from Philadelphia, which is not ever a thing that’s going to hap...

Tristan Thompson, Apparently Forgetting Everything That Happened This Summer, Talks Shit About East Contenders
LeBron James left the Cleveland Cavaliers this summer. You may have heard. He is now a member of the Los Angeles Lakers. His minutes on the Cavaliers will be used by some combination of Cedi Osman, Rodney Hood, and I guess David Nwaba. Here is video evidence that Tristan Thompson somehow managed to ...

Zhaire Smith's Rookie Season Is Already A Total Bummer
The 76ers provided an unexpected and troubling update on the condition of rookie Zhaire Smith Thursday afternoon. Smith apparently had a bad allergic reaction to food and required something called a thoracoscopy. Recovery from the procedure, presumably along with whatever required it in the first pl...

Kevin Durant Bemoans Basketball Media's "Pure Hate For Me Obviously"<em></em>
Here’s a recent quote from the 2008 Rookie of the Year, 2014 MVP, and eight-time All-NBA selection, who has won the Finals MVP two years running, and who elected, on two separate instances, to sign with the Golden State Warriors: “You know they’re not going to give me anything.” When asked why he’s ...

So, Uh, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Is Writing For The <i>Veronica Mars</i> Reboot?
Veronica Mars—the comedy/mystery show about a teen girl detective that built a cult following during its initial run in the mid-2000s and helped launch Kristen Bell into her current position as America’s Sweetheart—is coming back for new episodes on Hulu next year. ...

Nuggets Coach Mike Malone Still Has His Handles
Mike Malone might resemble a dirty Baltimore cop with a good heart from some musty procedural, but he could still drop you with his crossover. Watch him ably dribble his way through a defensive drill with his players in Nuggets training camp....

The Lakers' Wayward Bozos Assemble, And LeBron Gives Them A Tender Nickname
One of the funniest arcs of this NBA offseason was watching the Lakers roster coalesce around its new centerpiece, each new contract landing like a punchline. LeBron James is here now—the rest of his California-loving superteam is just dawdling, right? When does Paul George’s flight get in? Can’t K...

Thibs Is Still Working On Jimmy Butler
Timberwolves owner Glen Taylor is turning up the heat on Scott Layden and Tom Thibodeau to move quickly on a deal to move a disgruntled Jimmy Butler out of town. But that doesn’t mean Thibodeau is ready to abandon the zombie Bulls project just yet—according to Woj, Thibs is staying after Butler whil...