nba Page 568 - Sports News, Headlines & Highlights

Brittney Griner Outs Herself As Already Out
It's been two days since Brittney Griner was unsurprisingly picked No. 1 overall in the WNBA draft by the Phoenix Mercury. As far as anyone can tell, Griner has not publicly mentioned her sexuality before. Now, in the most subtle of ways, the former Baylor star just did....

Jonathan Papelbon Is Afraid Obama "Wants To Take Our Guns From Us"
The Boston Marathon bombings have had a particular resonance for Phillies closer Jonathan Papelbon, who spent seven seasons with the Red Sox and says he once lived above the spot where one of the bombs detonated. Papelbon is rightly concerned about security at open gatherings in the wake of the atta...


Quentin Richardson And Tracy McGrady Back In The NBA, For Some Reason
Quentin Richardson and Tracy McGrady today signed deals with the Knicks and Spurs, respectively. Their contracts, which are good through the rest of the season, signal that New York and San Antonio are both determined to take another run at the 2003 NBA title....

Dion Waiters Threw Down An Especially Nasty Dunk Over Chris Andersen
After successfully dribbling between Jarvis Varnado and Norris Cole, Dion Waiters began to pick up steam as he made his way toward the rim. James Jones was wise enough to stop and get out of the way. Chris Andersen was not....

In An NBA First, The Canceled Celtics Game Won't Be Made Up
The Senators-Bruins game scheduled for last night was called off hours after the Boston Marathon bombings, and tonight's Pacers-Celtics game was the next to go. While the hockey will be made up, Indiana and Boston will finish the season with just 81 games played—and that's a first....

How An Achilles Tear Affects NBA Players (Or, Why Kobe Is Screwed)
Kobe Bryant, your favorite high-functioning sociopath and mine, tore his Achilles tendon Friday night during a win against the Warriors. We've been hearing about "torn Achilles" for years now, but for most fans, the operational definition of the injury remains ambiguous. You hear a player has torn a...

The Warriors Hazed Rookie Festus Ezeli By Removing His Car's Tires
They also hid the tires in different spots, and even filmed Ezeli's reaction. Still not as bad as what they did last week to Kent Bazemore's car. Harrison Barnes and Draymond Green are hereby warned to keep an eye on their rides....

Andre Iguodala Gets A Big Block, Finishes The Break With A Dunk
This one of just a handful of impressive plays that Andre Iguodala had during yesterday's Trailblazers-Nuggets game. It starts with him climbing the ladder to reject J.J. Hickson at the rim, and it ends with him receiving a nifty drop-off pass from Ty Lawson before throwing down a dunk. ...

Goodbye, Dirk Nowitzki's Out-Of-Control Beard
The damn thing lasted almost three months. The Mavericks swore to grow beards, bushy, unwieldy beards, until they got to .500. It wasn't easy, but with last night's win, the Mavs have crawled all the way back to respectability. As soon as the buzzer sounded, Dirk Nowitzki, the mountain manliest of D...

This Is The Man Who Operated On Both Kobe Bryant And Zack Greinke Yesterday
Sure, he looks like he should be at the center of an involved murder mystery on General Hospital, but Dr. Neal ElAttrache spent a good chunk of his Saturday operating on both Zack Greinke's collarbone and Kobe Bryant's achilles. Both surgeries were completed without incident, if you couldn't tell ju...

Kobe Bryant Will Fuel His Comeback By Imagining Naysaying Media Even As Media Continue To Nuzzle Kobe Tenderly
Sorry for yet more Kobe coverage on an otherwise pleasant Saturday, but as we could’ve witnessed the last of the man for the next, oh, ever, it’s worth trying to figure out whether and how he could come back from the most appropriately named injury in sports. During the press scrum after his apparen...

Kobe Bryant Sustains Probable Torn Achilles, Vents About It On Facebook
Kobe Bryant went down in a heap last night against the Warriors, and the Lakers say the 34-year-old probably tore his left Achilles tendon. That's especially grim news for a guy who'd already been making all sorts of wistful noises about retirement....

Why NBA Players Hate Buzzer-Beaters
The last bits of the first three quarters of NBA games bring a lot of desperate shots. (Like the one above.) But many of them are released after the whistle. (Also like the one above.) Apparently players are self-conscious about their shooting percentages. On this week's excerpt from Slate's Hang U...


Russell Westbrook's Awesome Block Leads To Kevin Durant's Scary Dunk
Here, in just over 30 seconds, is a perfect encapsulation of what makes the Oklahoma City Thunder such a frighteningly good team. Not only do they have a point guard who can recover from a defensive lapse with a brutal chase-down block, they also have a small forward who can corral the loose ball, ...


The Major Leagues Were Never Really As Black As You've Been Told
Today Tyler Kepner’s New York Times story about the dearth of African-American players in the Major Leagues quietly distinguished itself from other articles in that vein, in that it didn’t cite a popular and wrong figure about the peak of black representation in baseball....

The Feds' Latest Gambling Bust Hauled In Some Great Aliases
Before the federals busted it on account of its being an illegal sports gambling operation, the illegal sports gambling operation known as Legendz Sports looked like a fine place to punch a clock....
