Category — Dwight Howard

The Clippers and C’s are dancing in circles about a trade involving Doc Rivers, Kevin Garnett, DeAndre Jordan and a No. 1 pick but neither club has blinked. Paul Pierce would join Rivers and Garnett in L.A. Then there’s the 1 about Blake Griffin and Eric Bledsoe heading to the Lakers for Dwight Howard. Supposedly, Chris Paul is pushing all of the buttons so wake us when someone actually does a deal. Until then…
N.Y. Times

It seems to be the only question out there when it comes to grading LeBron James now.
Is he better than Michael Jordan?
Clearly the best player in the game today, James can do a lot of things, even win a lot more rings, but it is different.
To me, he will never be Jordan for 1 main reason.
LeBron flops.
No, no longer in big games when a title is on the line. He has gotten past that now.
One ring shuts up a lot of folks.
But he flops on defense, when the smallest of players brush past. He admits to this. He calls it part of the game.
I can’t recall once Jordan flopping on the floor like a fish out of water just to get a call. Maybe James wants to be a part of the soccer revolution.
To his credit, James has never proclaimed he wanted to be like Mike, just wear his jersey number for most of his life until he took his talents to South Beach.
Who knew those talents were action skills as well.
Maybe this is a generation thing, because James is not alone in flopping. A good portion of NBA players do this and the league is even trying to make them pay with fines.
But the message is clear, players will pay to flop if it means getting the right call at the right time.
Crime might not pay but bad-act flopping sure does.

In Jordan’s NBA, flopping was looked upon as a weakness, a show you could not stand tall in the paint.
Jordan wouldn’t consider taking a step back let alone take a dive.
Nobody would. Not Magic, not Bird, not Barkley and surely none of the early Bad Boys from Detroit.
That seemed to change when the NBA went international. Maybe that was soccer’s influence.
I remember watching a young Laker center named Vlade Divac fall to the floor like he had been shot in the back because Kenny Smith ran into him. Smith was about 60 pounds lighter and 10 inches shorter, but Divac tumbled like a giant oak after being attacked by a chain saw.
His knees buckled and his body shivered as he dropped. Like a bad death scene in an old Western. Fit perfectly with the Hollywood crowd sitting courtside.
Magic Johnson looked stunned.
After getting the call, Divac jumped up and raced down court like a boy who just got away with stealing a piece of candy.
Flopping was suddenly the in thing.
Now it is James, a beast in shorts and a tank top, falling on demand.
He even complains when he is fouled hard in the playoffs going to the basket.
Has he not seen the video of the way Jordan was dismantled for years by the Detroit Pistons?
Jordan took it and then gave it out. Charles Barkley the same way.
Heck, James’ boss, Heat president Pat Riley, won with that style in New York before taking the monster to Miami. Now he says things are too rough, too.
Please.
The game has gotten softer on all levels. That is fine. But when you are playing for the highest of stakes winning is painful.
Jordan knew it, so did the rest of the guys back in the NBA’s heyday.
Now, it’s just an act they put on for us, a show that isn’t about to end.
Not when a flop can help lead you to a crown.
And another flopping crown might be fit for King James.

We wondered how long it would take for the cesspool that breeds scumbag sports agents would start bubbling over with envy and hate after Jay-Z entered the game. Didn’t take long at all.
We’ll withhold judgement until we see and read evidence he and his firm might have broken rules, but some of the things being written about Kimberly Miale, Jay Z’s new partner in crime, reeks with sexist overtones.
Paranoid?
“And if the NFLPA doesn’t look at the Jay-Z/(Geno) Smith relationship closely, what’s to stop (Drew) Rosenhaus from partnering with, say, Miami rapper Rick Ross?” Ben Volin writes.
Who’s to say Rosenhaus hasn’t? Granted, many African American male athletes are drawn to rappers and hip-hop personalities but since when has anyone cared how the sleezy Rosenhaus preys on some of the misguided athletes? For every Terrell Owens and Chad Ochocinco there are more educated athletes who have passed on Rosenhaus’ tired act.
Plenty of black athletes prefer taking a page out of the playbook of say a Kevin Durant, Grant Hill, Tim Duncan, Derek Jeter, Torii Hunter or Larry Fitzgerald, just to name a few. We just don’t always hear more about them because they don’t generate the tabloid fodder clowns like Owens and Ochocinco frequently do.
We just find all the whining, and timing of it, about Jay-Z curious, particularly after he added the lovely Skylar Diggins and Jets QB Geno Smith after his initial signing of Yankees star Robinson Cano.
Never heard writers and other agents jumping up to defend agents like Eugene Parker and the Goodwin brothers when Rosenhaus was slandering them years ago (and still could be for all we know) with blatant stereotypes and other nonsense. But it just doesn’t work that way, huh?

Floyd Mayweather Jr. tops Sports Illustrated’s list of the athletes who have bagged the most coin over the past year. And Mayweather has earned his estimated $90 million without a single commercial endorsement.
SI.com

Still want the Spurs Laker fans? Whaddya say again Magic?

Like the NCAA Tournament, some NBA player makes a name for himself during the playoffs. Stephen Curry, 1 of the best shooters we’ve ever watched and 1 who almost helped the Warriors stun the Nuggets today in Denver, could be 1 of those players. Writer Shaun Powell compiles a good list of some who might emerge. Another name we would add to it is San Antonio forward Kawhi Leonard. He isn’t spectacular at anything but good at plenty of things.
Sports On Earth

The Heat are the overwhelming favorites to win the NBA title again, and why shouldn’t they be? We’re hard-headed though. Actually, we’re sticking with our betting slip.
Eastern Conference
Heat over Bucks in 5; Nets over Bulls in 7; Pacers over Hawks in 5; Knicks over Celtics in 6.
Heat over Nets in 5; Pacers over Knicks in 6.
Heat over Pacers in 6.
Western Conference
Thunder over Rockets in 6; Clippers over Grizzlies in 7 (the Charles Barkley factor); Nuggets over Warriors in 7; Spurs over Lakers in 5.
Thunder over Clippers in 6; Spurs over Nuggets in 5.
Spurs over Thunder in 6.
Championship: Spurs over Heat in 7.

Not all is right in the Clippers’ clubhouse. DeAndre Jordan is pissed Vinny Del Negro has seriously cut his playing time and the frequent barking by Chris Paul at his teammates has also grown old. And, to make matters worst, the Clippers have stumbled down the stretch heading toward the NBA playoffs.
The timing obviously couldn’t be worst.
If they fall apart in the playoffs, does Paul, who will be a free agent, take his talents elsewhere? Some have speculated him going to the Lakers despite his recent comments he wanted to play for the Clip Joint all along (we’ll have some of what he’s smoking). But that’s hard to imagine with the serious cap hit the Lakers would take, particularly after they re-sign Dwight Howard.
Regardless, this season probably will be the end for Del Negro. Someone’s got to take the hit.
L.A. Times

They lead the league in points in the paint, mainly because they blow past defenders in their sometimes high-octane offense. The Nuggets won in Oklahoma City tonight by 10 and made them prime candidate to nail that No. 3 spot in the West. Laker fans, some of them still dreaming dreams of grandeur, want no parts of Denver. Go ahead Warrior fans.
Did we mention the Nuggets have captured 12 in a row? Didn’t think so.

With the latest toast coming at the expense of a Canadian club, Miami has now won 22 in a row. Should the old Lakers of 33 straight be shaking in their boots? Uh, no. One test of the streak comes Monday when the Heat visit the C’s.
But the NBA this year? Well, yeah. The Heat are huge favorites to repeat, particularly as they continue to play like this.
Makes us foolish dropping a quarter on the Spurs at 4-1 (from 5-1 on 2nd night of my last Vegas venture, sum bitches) to hijack the title, no?
Miami Herald