NBA playoffs Page 37 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights
Behold, The Most Useless Graphic Of The NBA Playoffs
The map above—from TNT last night—is one of those "who's getting the most buzz" graphics that are as ubiquitous as they are useless. Unfortunately, Houston and Portland both wear red, a nuance lost on whatever computer program generated this image. Better luck next time, computer program!...
Cool Charts: Where The NBA's Best Scorers Are Getting Their Shots
Last Friday on Grantland, Kirk Goldsberry released a great series of charts breaking down the top NBA scorers and shooters from various spots on the floor. The graphics—interactives, thanks to Bostonography's Andy Woodruff—are revealing as always, especially Dirk Nowitzki's:...
How Have NBA Pundits Fared In The First Round Of The Playoffs?
Most of the NBA's first-round playoff series are shaping up to be hotly contested matchups, so let's check in to see if the "experts" had them pegged right....
Blazers Win In Overtime, Mo Williams Wants To Fight Someone
The Rockets and Blazers went to overtime for the third time this series tonight and Portland beat Houston 123-120 in the extra session. The Blazers now lead the series 3-1. ...
Kevin Harlan With That Lean
Kevin Harlan expertly gives the world a better view of the Cosby-sweatered gentleman sitting behind the TNT booth during a break in the action between the Blazers and Rockets in Portland. Thanks, Kevin Harlan. ...
Mavs Beat Spurs On Vince Carter's Three-Point Buzzer-Beater
The Mavericks beat the Spurs 109-108 on a Vince Carter three-pointer at the buzzer. Down 108-106, Carter got the ball off the inbounds with 1.7 seconds left, pump-faked Manu Ginobili into the stratosphere, and drained a three from the corner as time expired. The play was reviewed and upheld, and th...
Nene Suspended One Game For Head-Butting Jimmy Butler
Wizards big man Nene has been suspended for Game 4 against the Bulls after this altercation with Jimmy Butler. Early in the fourth quarter of the Bulls win over Washington, Nene head-butted Butler, then grabbed him around the head and neck, and the two had to be pulled apart by referees and teamma...
Seriously, What The Hell Is Going On With The Pacers?
Things have been bad for the Pacers for about two months, during which the team took on the surly, listless post-holiday air of an unhappy family too long indoors. But even when they were playing their worst, it was hard to imagine this. Down 2-1 series to the eighth-seeded Hawks, the Pacers are in ...
Mike Miller Is Not A Chair, Kendrick Perkins
Get off of Mike Miller, Kendrick! He isn't a chair. Ah, what the heck. You deserve a quick breather. Keep workin' hard out there, Perk....
LaMarcus Aldridge And His Jumper Are Here To Torment
Here's how good LaMarcus Aldridge has been against the Rockets in the first two games of their playoff series: When I first saw this obviously fake and joke-y shot chart on Twitter this morning, my first thought wasn't, "Haha what a silly and stupid thing that is." It was, "Yep. Looks about right."...
Josh McRoberts Gets Away With A Flying Elbow To LeBron's Throat
Josh McRoberts put an elbow in LeBron James's throat near the end of tonight's playoff game, but somehow, the Bobcat wasn't called for anything more than a shooting foul....
Terry Stotts, Reinvented: How A Retread NBA Coach Became Cutting Edge
Players get better, and players get worse. This is a fundamental truth, and an arc we've always understood, analytics or not, as part of the fabric of not just sports, but performance and ability in general. Sometimes you get better at your job, sometimes you fall off. But we don't really look at co...
Report: Pacers Had Fistfight Before Game 1
Adrian Wojnarowski goes out of his way to downplay a practice fight between Lance Stephenson and Evan Turner as something normal for the close quarters of an NBA team, but that's not going to stop observers from pointing to it as one symptom—or possible cause—of the Pacers' precipitous decline....
Oh Hell, Root For The Wizards: John Wall's Brave, Stubborn Playoff Run
If you have watched much Washington Wizards basketball over the past four seasons, first of all, why, and I am so sorry—but also, you have seen John Wall chase down a ballhandler in transition, take off like a fucking F/A-18 off a carrier deck, and swat the absolute shit out of the ball. It's reall...
The Nets Are Very Old, But Their Defense Is Next Level
The average age of the Brooklyn Nets preferred starting lineup right now is 32.4. Joe Johnson, Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, and Deron Williams have seemingly been in our collective consciousness for decades. Even Shaun Livingston, the fifth member of that quintet, is best known for a gruesome knee in...
Tony Allen Is The Defensive Stopper You Can Root For
There's a certain stigma that often hounds players who are labeled as defensive stoppers in the NBA, a belief that no small part of their success is derived from the fact that they are simply willing to play like assholes. This was true of Bruce Bowen, who was never all that feisty but wasn't shy a...
Raptors Blame ESPN For Shot-Clock Malfunction [Update]
The shot clocks blew out in the third quarter of Saturday's Game 1 in Toronto, which led to pure absurdity: the Raptors' PA guy counting down the shot clock while looking at a stopwatch held by an NBA official next to him. When it expired, he would literally say "Horn!", and it was the funniest damn...
It's So Hard To Escape The Blazers
It's a question that we've asked before, and after falling to the Blazers in overtime last night, it's one that the Rockets are probably asking themselves a lot this morning: How the hell do you beat the Blazers?...
Russell Westbrook And Kevin Durant Are Awesome
This is a beautiful thing. In the first quarter of Grizzlies-Thunder, Russell Westbrook grabbed a rebound and, in the same motion, effortlessly flicked a pass three-quarters of the court that just so happened to land right in front of a streaking Kevin Durant for a fast break dunk that had no busin...
Goodbye, Evan Turner
What makes this a nice play is that Evan Turner thought Jeff Teague was going baseline, but Teague knew better and pulled up for the three, leaving Turner out to dry. What puts it over the top is that Turner and Roy Hibbert are in total synchronization. ...