basketball Page 65 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Pat Riley has lost his touch and the Miami Heat have jumped the shark
What does your imagination conjure when you think about Pat Riley, the executive? Is it the silver-foxed Riley dumping the nine championship rings he won as a player, executive, head coach, and assistant coach onto the table and letting their presence speak for itself? That finalized LeBron James a...
The feel-good story of a sports Sunday, the Los Angeles Lakers?
We, the American people, have had a lot of fun at the Los Angeles Lakers’ expense for most of 2022. LeBron James missed significant time early last season, and Anthony Davis missed the majority of the 2021-22 season. However, it became clear in January, when both of them were on the court around the...
The Second Coming of Dennis Smith Jr.
Maybe all he needed was to come home. Smith is from Fayetteville, North Carolina, and is now playing with the Charlotte Hornets, just a mere three hours from his hometown. The Hornets are Smith’s fifth team in six seasons. Last year, he split time between three teams, including the Hornets. So why h...
Waiving Josh Primo demonstrates why the Spurs are still a first-rate franchise
The Spurs’ announcement that they had released Josh Primo was the ultimate Friday evening news dump that caught the entire league by surprise. Lottery picks don’t get waived heading into their second season, and definitely not an hour before tipoff for a regular season matchup without forewarning. T...
Gus Johnson, not Ian Eagle, should succeed Jim Nantz as the voice of March Madness
Ian Eagle is really good at his job. Gus Johnson’s just better....
A decade after the Thunder traded James Harden, regret should linger
A decade after Oklahoma City traded James Harden on the eve of the 2012-13 regular season, it still stands as an atrocity upon the art of dynasty-building. As the central players involved in that deal wind down their Hall of Fame careers in bleak situations, there is no more denying it, Oklahoma Cit...
Westbrook definitely needs to be traded, but he’s far from the only reason Lakers are losing
Russell Westbrook was out Wednesday night with a hamstring injury as the Lakers were soundly defeated on the road against a Denver Nuggets squad missing Michael Porter Jr. and featuring a sub-100 percent Jamal Murray. Truthfully, the Lakers could have used Westbrook’s energy. Someone needed to stand...
Washington Wizards trying to relive glory days of mid-2000s mediocrity
The Washington Wizards of the mid-aughts will always be remembered more for how their time together ended than the actual run itself — and for good reason. The team only won one playoff series, and that was the year before it traded Kwame Brown for Caron Butler, who would make his only two all-star ...
Early returns for NBA stars… returning
While it’s too early to define the theme of this NBA season, the first week-plus has showcased stars returning from serious injuries. Damian Lillard, Zion Williamson, Jamal Murray, and Kawhi Leonard all saw their first action after lengthy absences, and the reviews have been all over the place....
Did you know Manhattan College canned its coach less than two weeks before the start of the season?
The Manhattan Jaspers start the 2022 college basketball season in a dozen days. Sounds like a great time to fire your head coach. And that’s exactly what happened in The Bronx (yes, Manhattan College is in The Bronx, get over it), as Steve Masiello was dismissed from the program just short of starti...
Will have some more of this, thank you
Tuesday night was Klay Thompson’s 651st regular-season game as a Golden State Warrior. When you add the 145 playoff games, Thompson’s been a part of 796 games in his career, and he’d never been ejected from one — until Tuesday night in Phoenix. ...
Early NBA season superlatives: Let’s hope this version of the Knicks lasts longer than ‘Bing bong!’
It’s hard to get a vibe on the NBA after one week of games. The Wizards started last 10-3, and New York fans were excitedly yelling “Bing bong!” before both came to depressing finishes. Klay Thompson didn’t return until midseason, and it looks like it may take Jamal Murray and Kawhi Leonard some tim...
Ten players that teams in the 'Lose-O-Rama for Wembanyama' should ship
After the matchup between Victor Wembanyama’s Metropolitans and Scoot Henderson’s G League Ignite teams earlier this month, where the projected No. 1 and No. 2 picks faced off in must-see-TV, half the NBA should have shifted into full-on tank mode. Why meddle in mediocrity if you’re the Orlando Magi...
Is Ben Simmons the most overrated player in NBA history?
Ben Simmons fouled out again Monday night. He’s fouled out of two of his first three games as a member of the Brooklyn Nets and has nearly as many fouls as points. So far, Simmons has posted 17 points, 14 fouls, 18 rebounds, and 21 assists in three games. This is the guy who was once touted as the “...
Stop praising NFL coaches for adopting college football tactics
The NFL finally trying college offenses and mobile QBs after snubbing its nose at them for decades is like praising your child for going diaper-free at 25 years old. Not only was it long overdue, but the negligence is concerning. All of these NFL writers love to tout the innovation from this new gen...
Brittney Griner loses appeal, nine-year sentence upheld by Russian court
Today, a Russian court upheld the nine-year sentence for WNBA player Brittney Griner. Nine years for a small amount of cannabis oil in her luggage. ...
Wouldn’t you love to hear what executives for the Panthers and Jazz are honestly thinking right now?
Professional sports are like many other industries. The goals of management and the employees are not always aligned....
This is what it's all about
It’s not usually supposed to work like this in baseball. The quirk, some would say the beauty, of the game is that the big at-bats can fall to anyone. They don’t always fall to a team’s star player, and in fact, they rarely do. Opponents spell out a strategy most of the time to make sure they don’t....
The NBA’s tanking problem is more perception than reality, and a relegation system won’t fix that
During NBA Commish Adam Silver’s apology tour session with beleaguered Phoenix Suns employees this weekend, he was confronted with another concern. In addition to apologizing for suspended team Governor Robert Sarver and his decades of misconduct, Silver was also besieged by a flood of questions abo...
It’s impossible to be completely miserable (or happy) during the sports equinox
There are 17 gazillion things happening in sports right now, and as much as I’d like to update you on all the happenings of the opening weeks of the NBA and NHL, the World Series-deciding MLB rounds, College Football Playoff-ramification slates, and every NFL, EPL, MMA, boxing match, game, contest, ...