In what qualifies as must-see regular season basketball in the NBA, there is no better matchup than the Celtics and Lakers.
Well, that’s one theory. The resurgence of the Celtics combined with the ongoing success of the Lakers once again rekindled this wonderful rivalry, which dates back to some searing competition in the 1960s. Larry Bird and Magic Johnson brought it back in the 1980s (while pretty much saving the NBA in the process) and now we have them once again among the league’s elite, accounting for the last two NBA titles.
But a little bit of the bloom is off the old rose as the two teams meet for the first time this season on Sunday afternoon in Boston before a national television audience. The Lakers are upholding their end of the deal, entering with a 36-11 record, best in the demanding Western Conference and second overall to Cleveland.
The Celtics? Well, let’s be charitable and just say they’re in a bit of a funk. They’ve dropped their last two games and have lost 10 of their last 16 to fall to No. 3 overall in the not-so demanding Eastern Conference. The Friday night loss to Atlanta could cost Celtics boss Doc Rivers a berth as the coach of the Eastern Conference All-Stars next month in Dallas. (That is not exactly high on Doc’s priority list right now.)
Not much has gone right for the Celtics since they thrashed the Magic on Christmas Day, improving to 23-5. Paul Pierce missed five games with a knee ailment and the team lost three of them. Kevin Garnett missed 10 games with a hyper-extended knee and the team struggled without him, losing six. Although he has returned, he bears little resemblance to the fiery and feisty KG who led the team to the NBA championship two seasons ago. He moved around like Billy Paultz in the Thursday night game in Orlando and was marginally better the next night in Atlanta.
Ray Allen and the words “expiring contract” are now being mentioned in the same sentence as the trade deadline nears, a heretical thought not too long ago. Allen, who scored only 9 points on Friday, is averaging 15.9 points a game, second fewest in his career. He’s also taking the fewest shots per game since he came to Boston, all the while leading the Celtics in total minutes played.
While Rajon Rondo has blossomed into an All-Star, and Pierce continues to play at a steady clip, the bench is a nightly challenge for Rivers. Rasheed Wallace has been up and down (but still leading the league in technical fouls) and sharpshooter Eddie House is in a slump. Rondo has no real backup and the Celtics miss the almost-forgotten Marquis Daniels, who is due back after the All-Star Game. He will have missed almost 30 games with a thumb injury.
The Lakers? They took advantage of a ridiculous, home-heavy schedule early in the season to break away from the rest of the West. They are 3-2 on their current Eastern swing, beating the tomato cans (New York, Washington and Philadelphia) while losing to Cleveland and Toronto. The Celtics are the third winning team they’ll face on the trip.
The defending champs have been very tough to beat with Pau Gasol in the lineup. The talented Spaniard has played in 30 games this season and the Lakers have won 25 of them by an average of 10 points a game. Gasol has missed 16 games with hamstring injuries and LA is 10-6 in those games.
Kobe Bryant, meanwhile, is poised to pass Jerry West as the all-time Lakers scoring leader. He is 47 points behind West and wouldn’t Bryant love to pass the man who drafted him against the team that so tortured his old boss in the 1960s? He averages 25.1 against the Celtics, but erupting for 48 would not be unBryant-like, even as he finishes up an uncharacteristically cold month for him (24 points a game versus more than 30 a game in November and December.)
The atmosphere in the Garden will be wall of sound stuff. The ‘Beat LA’ chants started here in the 1980s. But the Lakers won in Boston last season (110-109 in overtime) after getting beaten four times there the year before, including three in the NBA Finals. LA has won six of its last 10 regular season games in Boston, which is relatively unremarkable given how bad the Celtics were over most of that time period.
In the 1980s, these meetings were full of high drama and expectations. The two teams followed each other on a daily basis on the assumption they’d probably meet in the NBA Finals. ML Carr called them ‘The Fakers.’ The Fabulous Forum brought us Dancing Barry, the Rambis Youth and Randy Newman for the mood music. There were Hall of Famers at every position.
They may have another Finals meeting and it might be this year. But that’s a long way from now. The real injustice is that they see each other only twice during the season. That’s what makes this one so appealing.
Here’s a nugget you might not know: The Oklahoma City Thunder leads the NBA in inter-conference victories. Their victory Monday night in Atlanta pushed the surprising Thunder to 15-4 against Eastern Conference opponents. Not bad for a team which won only 23 games last season. They’ve won 23 already this season.
The success of the Thunder against the East (they are only 8-14 in their own conference) drives home the point that, once again, after a one-year blip, the Western Conference, top-to-bottom, is the best. In nine inter-conference matchups on Martin Luther King Day, the West prevailed in seven, highlighted by the Thunder’s win in Atlanta, the Mavericks’ win over the Celtics in Boston and the Lakers’ victory over the Magic at the Staples Center.
The numbers after Monday: the West has a 138-96 record against the East, which, on a percentage basis, is the biggest in five years (59 percent.) Nine teams in the Western Conference have winning records against the East and a tenth, Houston, is at .500. By contrast, five teams in the East own winning records against the West and a sixth, Toronto, is at .500.
Wasn’t it supposed to be different this season? Shaq was moving from West to East. Vince Carter was going to Orlando to make the Magic better. The Raptors spent like drunken sailors on shore leave and seemed to be poised to return to the Land of the Relevant, even though more than a few eyebrows were raised with the mother lode showered upon Hedo Turkoglu. The Wizards looked ready to return to the post-season with a healthy Gilbert Arenas (how has that worked out? Oh well.)
It seemed from the outside that the better teams in the East improved (the Celtics adding Rasheed Wallace, the Hawks’ adding Jamal Crawford) which would only strengthen the conference.
Well, the rich did get richer in the East. The Celtics, when healthy (still waiting, by the way, for that glorious day), are better. The Hawks are better. The Cavs may not match their 66 wins of a year ago, but they may be better suited for the playoffs. The Magic? Well, HoopsHype’s Eddie Johnson had two Orlando players (Carter, Dwight Howard) on his top 10 list of most disappointing players. Nonetheless, the Magic are 9-6 against the West and fourth overall in the East.
So what has caused such a shift from last season, when the Eastern Conference had a 231-219 record against the West? By the way, that has been the only season in the last five where the East has been remotely successful. To wit:
2005-06: West 252-198
2006-07: West 257-193
2007-08: West 258-192
2008-09: East 231-219
2009-10: West 138-96 (through Monday)
Here are a few thoughts.
- The lower echelon teams are in the East, again. Last year, there was a great divide in the West between the haves and the have-nots. Yes, the Phoenix Suns won 46 games which would have earned them a No. 4 seed in the East, and didn’t qualify for the playoffs. But the West also housed six of the worst seven worst teams in the NBA: Golden State, the Clippers, Sacramento, Minnesota, Oklahoma City and Memphis. Those five teams were 50-130 against the East, with the Kings a hideous 1-29. The remaining nine teams in the West last season were 181-89 against the East. This year, with the Nets leading the way (0-16 against the West), the worst teams appear to be back in the East. Five of the seven losingest teams are in the East.
- The Western Conference upper echelon is, again, stronger. As of Monday, there were 11 teams over .500, including all five teams in the Southwest Division. The worst of those, New Orleans, was 21-19, which would be the No. 5 record in the East. The 11 teams with winning records are 114-64 against the East. It certainly appears that for the third straight year, a 40-something win team from the West won’t make the playoffs. (Golden State’s 48-win team of 2007-08 remains the gold standard for winning teams not qualifying.) And, it could well be, that for the third straight year, a 30-something win team from the East will make it. As of Monday, Nos. 5-7 in the East were one game over .500 and No. 8 Chicago was on a pace to win 36 games.
- To date, the Western Conference has had the majority of home games. Led by the Lakers’ 26, the five teams with the most home games all reside in the Western Conference. The Spurs and Trail Blazers have played 23 while the Jazz and the Clippers have played 22. (Miami played its 22nd home game Tuesday night, most in the East. The Cavs, with 17, have played the fewest.)
- Nine of the Lakers’ 12 victories against the Eastern Conference have come in the Staples Center (as well as their only loss to an Eastern team, the Christmas Day defeat to Cleveland.) The Lakers play their next seven games on the road against Eastern Conference teams. The Eastern swing features bookend beauties (Cleveland on Thursday and their first meeting with the Celtics on Jan. 31. But the five games in between are all ho-hummers: New York, Toronto, Washington, Indiana and Philadelphia. Only one of those teams, Toronto, is currently among the top eight. The Spurs, meanwhile, will be on the road for virtually all of February, playing nine of their 11 games away from the ATT Center. But only three of those roadies will be against Eastern Conference teams.
- Is there any hope for the East? Well, no team has played more road games than the Cavaliers (25) while the Celtics have played 21 (and have more home losses in fewer games than road losses. Go figure) But the Cavs only have 11 games remaining against the West, which might bode well for them in the overall standings, but won’t do much to bridge the sizeable East-West gap. The Celtics have 17 games left against the West, including two each against the Lakers, Nuggets, Rockets and Trail Blazers. However, the surprising Charlotte Bobcats have 19 games left against Western Conference teams – 12 of them on the road. And the home games include Dallas, the Lakers and the vaunted Thunder.
So, barring something unforeseen over the second half of the year, the 2009-10 appears to be reverting to the form we’ve seen throughout the last half of the last decade. The West will reign supreme in head-to-head play. One (or perhaps) two teams from the West will get shafted by not making the playoffs while a team with fewer wins playing in an inferior conference will get in, most likely with a losing record.
Does this mean the champ will also come from the West? Hmm. Seven of the 10 NBA champs came from the West last decade, but only two teams won titles. Three Eastern singletons (Detroit, Miami and Boston) interrupted that run. The Lakers may end up with the league’s best record and homecourt advantage throughout the playoffs. And, if they do, they can thank the East for being a big part of that.
They slowly emerged on the NBA scene in the 1980s. They became mainstays in the 1990s. In the last decade, for the first time in league history, one of them became a Most Valuable Player and another became a Rookie of the Year. Two would earn Most Improved Player Awards and two others would earn Sixth Man Awards.
For the foreign-born players, whose sole basketball experience prior to the NBA had been playing in Europe, Asia or South America, this past decade was one of remarkable growth in both numbers and talent. At the beginning of this season, the NBA counted 83 international players on rosters from 36 countries. DirkNowitzki, the only German in the NBA, won the 2006 Most Valuable Player award. PauGasol, one of five Spaniards in the league, won the rookie honors in 2002.
Those two continue to excel to this day and are the starting forwards on my All-Foreign first team of the decade. I decided to exclude foreign-born players who played college ball in the United States. Thus, no Steve Nash (a lock for first team otherwise) and no Andrew Bogut (who wouldn’t have made it anyway.)
It wasn’t hard selecting the first team. After that, it got a bit dicier. One of the revelations: a lack of high-caliber guards from across the pond (or below the Equator.)
And it was hard to eliminate people like Vladimir Radmanovic, who nonetheless is still responsible for my all-time favorite story involving a foreign player. During the 2002 World Championships in Indianapolis, Radmanovic was kicked off his national team. He then proceeded to watch them play sitting in the stands, wearing his national team sweats.
At any rate, here is one writer’s take on the best foreign-born players of the last 10 years.
Explanation: There really can’t be a whole lot of debate about this unit, unless you want to use the traditional small forward/power forward configuration. While out of action this season, Yao has developed into, arguably, the league’s best center. And he did so carrying the weight of, oh, a billion people on his shoulders.
Nowitzki right now may rank as the greatest foreigner ever to play in the league – and we can only wonder what would have happened to him had Rick Pitino got his wish and been able to draft him in 1998. (Paul Pierce wasn’t a bad consolation prize.)
Gasol has helped turn the Lakers into annual title contenders. Parker and Ginobili each have three championship rings from the Spurs with Parker getting MVP honors for the 2007 NBA Finals.
Second Team
Center: Vlade Divac, Serbia
Forwards: Peja Stojakovic, Serbia; Andrei Kirilenko, Russia
Guards: Hedo Turkoglu, Turkey; Jose Calderon, Spain
Explanation: Those who have only briefly become NBA fans may need a refresher on the remarkable Divac, whose career spanned parts of three decades. He was a critical member of the Kings from 2000-2004 and, back then, Sacramento was really good, just not good enough to overtake the Lakers. He was a gifted passer; only three others in NBA history have amassed 13,000 points, 9,000 rebounds, 3,000 assists and 1,500 blocked shots: Kevin Garnett, Hakeem Olajuwon and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. (Tim Duncan should join that group this season.)
Stojakovic was also a big-time player on those early 2000s Kings teams and has an All-NBA 2nd team selection on his resume from 2004. He remains one of the game’s most dead-eye shooters. Kirilenko has slumped lately, but his athleticism and quirkiness helped change the image of the tall, slow-footed, mechanical European big man. Kirkilenko remains the only player of this group to have made an All-Defensive Team. He actually made three of them, including the first team in 2005-06.
Turkoglu gets slotted as a guard here because, basically, he is one, despite his height. He cashed in on a big playoff performance in 2009, helped by a vintage Game 7 submission in Boston against the Celtics. Calderon is one of two players on my All-Foreign teams never to have been drafted. But he now is in his fifth season with the Raptors and is usually among the league leaders in free throws and assist-to-turnovers.
Third Team
C: Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Lithuania
F: Mehmet Okur, Turkey; Boris Diaw, France
G: Andres Nocioni, Argentina; Leandro Barbosa, Brazil
Explanation: As always, selecting the last members of the team proved to be a challenge. I can already hear the Luis Scola Fan Club (of which I am a dues-paying member) complaining. But Scola had only two years of NBA play this decade, so he loses out on that. But I love the guy. Ilgauskas is a great story, recovering from apparent career-ending foot woes to be a big part of the Cavaliers’ recent success. He’s been in two All-Star Games. Okur plays center on occasion, but, for purposes of this discussion, is designated as a forward. He has an All-Star Game appearance on his CV.
Diaw has stumbled a bit the bast couple of years, but he was a human Swiss Army Knife for the Mike D’Antoni Phoenix Suns in the middle of the decade, winning Most Improved Player honors in 2005-06. The never-drafted Nocioni gets in as a guard, even though he plays mostly forward. But he has guard size and he needs to be on this list, especially given the dearth of guards.
Barbosa, the NBA’s Sixth Man of the Year winner in 2007 (one year before Manu Ginobili won it) rounds out the team. He may not even be the best Brazilian playing right now (Nenê, AndersonVarejao) but, again, he gets the nod because of lack of competition for the position.
Toughest Omissions
Scola and Nene were the two hardest. Varejao and Mickael Pietrus come next. Radmanovic, Rasho Nesterovic, and even Andris Biedrins might find their way onto similar lists. Just not this one. And the third highest drafted foreign-born player (after Yao and Andrea Bargnani) played most of the decade and didn’t even get remote consideration. That would be the underwhelming DarkoMilicic, the No. 2 overall pick in 2003. Bargnani will get consideration for the next decade, along with YiJianlian, Rudy Fernandez, and, possibly, some guy named Ricky Rubio.
There is undeniable basketball DNA in Jonas Jerebko’s makeup.
His dad, Chris, played for Jim Boeheim at Syracuse. His mom, Elaine, played professionally in Sweden. His uncle, Peter, was a deadeye shooter at LeMoyne.
Jonas, who was born in tiny, isolated, not-exactly-hoops-crazy Kinna, Sweden, some 22-plus years ago, played everything and anything before understandably settling on basketball.
“I played golf, soccer, handball, basically all sports,’’ he said. “But when I got to be 16 or 17, I concentrated on basketball.”
Good move. He sprouted to 6-8, which sort of ended any hopes he might have of becoming the next JesperParnevik. He started playing professionally in his native land at the age of 17, spurning not only a basketball scholarship to the University of Buffalo (where his paternal grandparents live) but also offers from some pretty high-powered European teams who had liked what they saw of Jerebko when he played for the national team.
“Real Madrid. Benneton Treviso, Bologna. They all offered contracts,” Jerebko said. “That changed my mind about going to college and put me in a whole different direction.”
He decided to stay in Sweden, where he played for two years. He then landed a job in Italy for Angelico Biella, an A League team outside Milan. He added weight. He grew an inch. His game improved. He toyed with entering the NBA draft after his first season in Italy, but decided to stay for a second.
“I’m glad I did,’’ he said. “It allowed me another year to grow.”
Then, last June, Jerebko was draft eligible and the Detroit Pistons chose him with the 39th pick. On the surface, this looked like it might have been one of those throwaway selections in the second round in which the player stays overseas and, maybe, crosses the pond at some future point. Jerebko had no such plans.
“I felt like I was ready,’’ he said. “I had two years under my belt in Italy.”
Said Pistons’ hoops boss Joe Dumars, “a couple of our scouts had seen Jonas play last season and we had a pretty good handle on who he was. We felt like it was a no-brainer to take him in the second round.”
And, Dumars added, he also felt that Jerebko intended to play in the NBA.
“But,’’ Dumars added, “we knew he was a good, young player. But he has exceeded our expectations so far.”
You think? Jerebko may not have been a household name outside of Kinna last June, but six months later, he is making it pretty much impossible not to be noticed by any semi-serious NBA observer. He has started 21 of the 22 games in which he has appeared, moving into the starting rotation on Nov. 3, helped by an injury (ruptured disc) sustained by Tayshaun Prince. He dropped a season-high 22 points on the LA Clippers on Nov. 27 and twice has gone for 11 rebounds.
He has endeared himself to the worker-conscious Pistons’ public, serving notice in the exhibition season when he got into a fight with Jamaal Magliore.
“It was just a reaction,’’ Jerebko said of the incident. “It was a physical game and something happened.”
He has been embraced by the Swedish players on the Detroit Red Wings, who have taken him to dinner and invited him to their games. He is finding the adjustment to the NBA much less difficult in terms of culture shock than his arrival in Italy after spending his entire life in Sweden.
And, he has made believers not out of just Dumars, but out of his coach, John Kuester, and his teammates, from veteran Ben Wallace to fellow rookie Austin Daye.
“You can get labeled in this game,’’ Kuester said, referring to the oft-held (if not necessarily true) that European hoopsters are not as rugged as their American counterparts. And weighing only 230, Jerebko does not come across as a brute.
“But our players respect him and recognize that he is one of the hardest workers on the team,” Kuester said. “He is not afraid at all to get his nose dirty out there. He takes a challenge.”
Arguably, Jerebko might already have met his biggest challenge – getting to the NBA after learning and playing the game in a country that isn’t exactly known for producing blue-chip basketball players. His dad played professionally in Sweden after his stint at Syracuse. It was in Sweden where Chris Jerebko met his wife and where the family (which also includes a daughter, 20-year-old Johanna, who plays professionally in the country) still resides.
Inarguably, Jonas Jerebko is the first player who was born in Sweden and went through the Swedish basketball system to make it to the NBA. And, incontrovertibly, he may be having the most surprising rookie season of any NBA newbie, even Brandon Jennings.
“I’m just a rookie,’’ he said. “I didn’t expect to be playing this much. But I think I’m doing pretty good so far.”
He not only is starting at the small forward position, he is playing nearly 28 minutes a game. He’s averaging 8.2 points and 5.5 rebounds a game – and 12.8 points and 7.2 rebounds per in his last nine. Those are the kinds of numbers he submitted for his Italian League team.
But, Kuester hastens to add, numbers do not begin to define Jerebko’s impact.
“He gives us so many extra possessions with his hustle plays,’’ the coach said. “He can put the ball on the floor. He has guarded all the great players in our league and he moves his feet very well for a big man.”
What Kuester can’t say is what lies in store for his rookie forward when Prince does return. The Pistons have been decimated by injuries this season, but, as the saying goes, when one door closes, another one opens. And Jerebko has been the most pleasant of surprises in an otherwise underwhelming start for the Pistons.
“I don’t know when Tay (Prince) is coming back, but we will make a decision at that point,’’ Kuester said. “But I can tell you this: he (Jerebko) has gotta play.”
His name is on The List, right there with LeBron, Dwyane and the rest of the marquee 2010 free agents. Ray Allen might well be going to the Hall of Fame one day, but he’s also going on 35 (next July 20) and, statistically, is down in just about every offensive category.
So, time to trade him, right? Get younger, find a team eager to absorb an expiring contract and go from there. Amazingly, those scenarios were out there a few weeks back, offered anonymously, of course, and coinciding with Allen’s early-season shooting woes. They are as ludicrous now as they were back then. Ray Allen isn’t going anywhere - nor should he.
Why would the Celtics even remotely entertain parting with Allen, who has been everything they wanted and possibly more in his two-plus seasons in Boston? (My guess? They’re not.) He still demands coverage and respect, as he demonstrated last Tuesday when he blitzed the Bobcats for 27 points, knocking down five of six three-pointers. Prior to that game, he had been shooting 30 percent from three-point range (his career average is 39.7) and an even uglier 26 percent over the previous six games.
To that, the Celtics and Allen say, ‘so what?’
He’s been through these kinds of things before, most notably in the 2008 Eastern Conference semifinals against the Cleveland Cavaliers, where he couldn’t make anything. (He always contended he wasn’t in a slump but, rather, wasn’t getting enough shots.) He came out of it rather nicely against the Pistons in the conference finals and then had an excellent NBA Finals, making one of the signature baskets of the series, the blow-by of Sasha Vujacic at the end of Game 4, sealing an improbable Celtics come-from-behind victory. (He also had another memorable basket in that game, a baseline, under the basket drive for layup.)
Allen’s name did come up last summer in trade rumors, when the Celtics were supposedly gauging interest in Rajon Rondo. (The team’s general manager, Danny Ainge, denies they were ever seriously interested in trading Rondo, but other GMs swear the Celtics were listening.) To many teams, Allen would be a valuable pickup, but, in a testament to the times, the value would likely be due to more to his contract than his game.
Ainge has not divulged his end-game strategy for Allen, but it has to involve keeping him in Boston after this season. Originally, when the Celtics made the deals for Allen and Kevin Garnett, observers gave them a three-year window to win, primarily because that was the length remaining on Allen’s contract. This is Year 3. They’ve already won one championship and, after a four-game road sweep of Miami, Charlotte, San Antonio and Oklahoma City, are 16-4 and looking very much like they’ll be in the chase to the end once again.
That chase will have to include Allen. He enjoys being in Boston (who wouldn’t with the teammates he has?) and continues to show he is still effective. His son, Walker, is getting top-of-the-line treatment for juvenile diabetes in Boston at one of the great medical centers of the world. (There was a rumor over the summer that his daughter Tierra, a junior in high school, might move from South Carolina to live with her dad for the last two years of high school. Alas, that did not happen.)
It isn’t as if Allen has gone Kevin Costner on the Celtics or anything like that. He’s averaging 15.6 points a game and has an overall shooting percentage of 46.3. Only twice in his career has he bettered that; last year (48 percent) and 2000-01 (48 percent.) Doc Rivers is keeping the minutes down. Allen is still almost automatic at the line (93.3 percent.) He won’t be a candidate for the All-Defensive Team anytime soon, but, like Paul Pierce, has emerged as a top-notch team defender in the Celtics’ schemes, anchored and egged-on by the indefatigable Garnett.
“You never talked about Ray playing defense before he got to Boston,’’ said the Suns’ coach, Alvin Gentry. “He’s probably playing the best defense of his career.”
Also, there is no overstating Allen’s value in the locker room and as a mentor to the younger players, particularly Rondo. Allen made a point of taking Rondo under his wing two years ago and Rondo has been an eager and absorbent protégé (although he still can be an occasional handful.) Allen’s practice habits, his professional demeanor, his “every day is Groundhog Day in the NBA” approach to the grind of a season are all enviable (and not all that common) attributes.
Allen has expressed a desire to play beyond this year and keeps himself in excellent shape. Generally, in the NBA, the guards start to lose it first, right around where Allen is now. But I can easily see the Celtics re-signing Allen for two or three more years. Reggie Miller, remember, played very well and very competitively to the age of 40. There’s no reason to think Allen can’t do the same.
Garnett has two more years on his deal and Pierce, who can opt out of is contract at the end of this season, has one more. Either way, they’re both going to be around next year. There’s no reason to expect Allen won’t be with them, certainly not on the part of the Celtics.
Let LeBron and the others steal the limelight. Allen will be perfectly content to re-up and stay where he is.
And when he does, you just might want to keep that window ajar a little while longer.
There still are some impressive names due to hit the free agent market next summer. We all know the Big Three: LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh.
But one individual with some lofty credentials deliberately removed himself from the inevitable, frenzied, open marketplace: two-time Most Valuable Player Steve Nash.
His original, six-year free-agent deal with the Suns – you know the one Mark Cuban wouldn’t give him because of concerns over age, injury, durability and declining productivity – expires at the end of this season. But last summer, Nash and his agent, Bill Duffy, went to management and suggested a two-year extension, running through the 2012 season. The Suns agreed.
Why did he forego the free agent market, in which he participated and from which he cashed in during the summer of 2004?
“The option of waiting until next summer to be a free agent is totally speculative,’’ Nash said. “I don’t know what would have happened or what would be available. Here, I had an opportunity to play with a great group of guys I enjoy, to overcome a disappointing year last year, to turn things around. There’s a lot of reward in that. We may not be the most talented team in the league. We may not be expected to win a championship. But there’s still a lot to play for.”
Few looked at the Suns as one of the league’s more talented teams before the start of the season. Then they opened by matching the best record in franchise history (8-1) with Nash playing to his MVP form of three and four years ago. He’s already had games of 20 assists (Oct. 30 vs. Golden State) and 17 assists (Nov. 8 vs. Washington.) He helped hand the Celtics their first defeat with a double-double (16 points, 12 assists on Nov. 6 in Boston.) He became the Suns’ all-time leader in made three-pointers (Nov. 3 vs. Miami.) Two weeks into the NBA season Nash was leading the league in assists, shooting 54 percent from three-point range and, needless to say, a nearly flawless 93 percent from the line.
“He is still one of the top five point guards in the NBA and he has shown it so far this season. He has been phenomenal,’’ said Suns general manager Steve Kerr.
And with coach Alvin Gentry opening things up again on offense, you have to think Nash’s numbers and effectiveness will continue to impress. That’s good for the Suns, who will have him locked up at reasonable numbers ($11 million per with some deferrals) for the next two years, when he will be 38.
“The number one factor in signing that extension was that he’s 35,’’ Duffy said. “If he was 30, we’d be having an entirely different conversation. We would play it out for sure. But he likes the situation in Phoenix and ownership stepped up.”
They did indeed. Kerr said there was some “public sentiment” last summer urging the Suns to trade Nash. He admitted, “we got a lot of calls about Steve, trade-wise. The two lines of thinking were to either keep Steve and try to rebound from a lousy season, or sell high (trade Nash) and go young.
“To me, there was never a thought of moving him,’’ Kerr continued. “You just don’t move a guy who is that important to the franchise; he’s the face of the franchise. To trade a guy like that, who is still a helluva player, who is the heartbeat of the team, who brings in the fans to watch the team, I’m not going to do that. That’s crazy. He is going to help us.”
Kerr also believes that Nash’s days in Phoenix could go beyond the extension. He sees Nash as a John Stockton clone in terms of taking care of his body and looking for innovative methods to stay fresh. (Stockton played 82 games in his final NBA season, during which he turned 41.) There are summers, for instance, where Nash will rarely pick up a basketball, Duffy said. Instead, he will play soccer, cross-train.
“He definitely has found the fountain of youth,’’ Duffy said.
Kerr said, “Steve is such a freak of nature with his preparation in the offseason. During the season, he sits in a cold tub, like 52 degrees, after every practice and every game. He loads up on fruit. He knows how to take care of his body. Every summer he actively searches for ways to improve his conditioning. It’s plain to me, he’s going to be very successful for the next few years.”
Duffy also said Nash, who was born in South Africa and raised in Canada, has talked about playing overseas when his NBA days are over just for the experience. He said Nash, who has played in international competitions for Canada, could qualify for a British passport by virtue of family being born in England. (Sort of like Chris Kaman ending up playing for Germany in the Olympics.)
But those days are a ways away. Now, Nash’s focus is on the here and now and getting the Suns back to where they have been since he came to Phoenix – among the league’s elite. He’s the only MVP in NBA history to never have appeared in an NBA Finals and, in the minds of most, that is unlikely to change in 2010. Nash’s take? Dismiss him and the Suns at your own peril.
“This is a whole fresh start for us,’’ he said. “We have a lot of new players. Last year was basically a throw-away year with so many things thrown at us. We’re not really sure what to expect going into this season. So we’re just trying to find ourselves and try to be as positive and work as hard as we can everyday to get a little bit better.”
There’s a deadline looming in Rajon Rondo’s mind – and it’s not the one about which most NBA watchers are talking. It’s not about a contract extension for the slick Celtics’ point guard, who is beginning his fourth season in Boston. He claims that doesn’t occupy a single minute of his thinking.
“I gotta get ready for the season,’’ Rondo said. “I haven’t even given it (the extension) a thought.”
His nose did not appear to be growing as he spoke and, in fact, Doc Rivers said he has seen no evidence that a possible extension is consuming his point guard’s thinking. On the contrary, insists the Celtics coach.
“It has not been a distraction for anyone, not for him, not for us,’’ Rivers said. “And he has been sensational (in the preseason.) Look, it’s not exactly revolutionary for an NBA player to be in this position. It happens all the time. Rajon has handled it great and I think it will work out. It usually does. It’s rare when it doesn’t.”
The Celtics have until Oct. 31 to sign Rondo to an extension which would kick in starting with the 2010-11 season. If nothing is done, then Rondo would become a restricted free agent at the end of the 2009-10 season, with the Celtics still holding the right to match any offer. However, there is some risk in letting that scenario unfold because a number of teams have targeted the summer of 2010 for spending on prospective free agents LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh. If they all stay put, the money might be redirected elsewhere (to, say, a restricted free agent point guard from Boston.)
Rondo certainly has made a case for a significant raise on the $2.6 million he is due to earn this season, an amount determined by the NBA rookie scale. (It is roughly half of what the Bulls’ second-year point guard, Derrick Rose, will earn this season and some $300,000 less than Jonny Flynn, the Minnesota rookie and No. 6 overall pick in 2009, will earn.) In three years with the Celtics, he has gone from being SebastianTelfair’s backup (with even a DNP-Coach’s Decision along the way) to an almost indispensable member of arguably the best starting five in the NBA, inarguably on one of the handful of NBA teams with legitimate championship aspirations. And he has done it the last two years with no real backup.
But how valued? And how valuable? Those are some of the issues that the Celtics and Rondo’s agent, the estimable Bill Duffy, are trying to hash out by Halloween. The Celtics don’t see this first deadline as all that important, given that they can always re-visit the issue next summer if things don’t work out this week.
“I honestly think that he will be a Celtic for life,” Rivers said of Rondo.
Says Rondo, “You gotta live for the present. I can’t think too much about the future because nothing is guaranteed. You never know what might happen.”
While Rondo’s improvement has been dramatic – last spring, he became the only Celtic other than Larry Bird to have three triple-doubles in the same postseason – he still is only 23 (he turns 24 in February.) If, as Rivers suggests, Rondo is going to be a Celtic lifer, then Rondo might want to think about what a 2011-12 or a 2012-13 Celtics team might look like. Ray Allen, for instance, is in the final year of his contract, although he shows little sign of wearing down. Paul Pierce has two years left on his deal, Kevin Garnett three. All will be well into their 30’s and slowing down when Rondo theoretically would be hitting his prime.
There were rumors this past summer that the Celtics were shopping Rondo, despite his brilliant play in the postseason. The thinking was that Rondo, who can be either high maintenance or simply complex depending on your view, might not handle a big contract the way the Celtics would prefer. Both Rivers and Celtics GM Danny Ainge denied that was the case.
Ainge, after all, was the one who saw something in Rondo, trading a No. 1 pick to Phoenix in 2006 so the Suns would pick the sophomore out of Kentucky at No. 21 overall. And, it was Ainge, with the blessing of ownership, who refused to include Rondo in either the deal for Allen or the deal for Garnett, even if it meant the deal would fall apart. That’s how much the Celtics thought of Rondo back then. (Neither Ainge nor Duffy would comment for this article.)
The sticky part now, potentially, is putting a monetary value on Rondo. The top-flight young point guards in the league (Chris Paul, Deron Williams, Tony Parker) all make more than $11 million a year. Does Rondo deserve to join that elite trio? In all likelihood, this is where Duffy would like to see Rondo land. Or is the next level down (Jameer Nelson, Jose Calderon, Andre Miller, Mo Williams) more indicative of his worth? All of those gents make between $6 million and $9 million per. This probably is where the Celtics would prefer to slot Rondo.
The two gray eminences at the position, Steve Nash and Jason Kidd, both will pocket around $8 million each this year in the first year of new deals signed over the summer.
“The second contract you get is for what you have done in the league, and what you can do, even further down the road,’’ Rondo said.
Rivers has spoken warily in the past of the perils of young players looking for big deals and focused on things other than winning. He does not see Rondo in that category.
“The (second) contract that a player gets will be a good guideline as to where his career is and where it is going,’’ Rivers said. “If you are like Rondo, who will get a big deal, it’s because he has put the work into his game and he’s proven it. It’s good for him.”
Regardless of whether a deal is reached by Saturday, the Celtics’ plan for Rondo to be there, hopefully, in June when they raise another championship banner. And if they do, you can bet that No. 9 on the Celtics will have had a big hand in it.
As we enter Michael-Fest this weekend at the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, hagiography is blurring history a little.
Michael Jordan is the “The Best Ever.” ESPN The Magazine says so in a special Hall of Fame issue. The Chicago Bulls website says so. (You’d expect someone else?) Many, many followers of the NBA think that is the case as well.
It’s become unfashionable, bad form and even blasphemous these days to suggest otherwise. Not to diminish or devalue what Jordan did; he is, unquestionably, the greatest player of his time. But of all time?
I recently came across this quote from Bulls executive John Paxson, a former teammate of Jordan’s: “I know I’m biased because I played with him, but in my mind, he’s easily the greatest player to ever play. I don’t know how you can match what he did on the floor or his winning.”
It’s the second sentence, not the first, which calls for a response. Specifically, the last three words: “or his winning.”
Michael Jordan won a lot. He won six NBA titles. He won two Olympic Gold medals. He won an NCAA title. You’d want him on your starting five if the fate of western civilization was on the line. But, Mr. Paxson his “winning” doesn’t come close to matching that of one William Felton Russell. No one’s does.
So, if you define greatness as success, or as achieving your goal constantly above all else and all others, there is no one in the history of American team sports, not just the NBA, who won more than Bill Russell.
This isn’t a case of a Boston bias. In 1980, the Professional Basketball Writers Association named Russell as the greatest player in NBA history. He had retired 11 years earlier after a remarkable record that, in all likelihood, will go unmatched. He played 13 seasons in the NBA and his teams won 11 NBA championships, including eight in a row. It lost in the Finals one year when he was hurt. Nobody, not even Jordan, put up numbers like that.
Russell completely revolutionized the game. Until he came around, the notion that a defensive-oriented center could dominate and control a game was unthinkable. But he did. He did it with a combination of amazing athleticism (he also was a high jumper at the University of San Francisco), timing, jumping ability and, above all else, intelligence. There probably weren’t many games when Russell played that he wasn’t the smartest player on the floor.
There was no model for Bill Russell when he entered the NBA in the 1956-57 season. He wasn’t the logical “Next Player XX.’ He set the mold. The Celtics had a good team when he joined them – as opposed to Jordan, who joined a terrible Chicago team – but it had never so much as advanced to the NBA Finals, even with Hall of Famers like Bob Cousy and Bill Sharman on the roster. Russell changed all that – and in his very first season.
Jordan, too, revolutionized the game in one aspect: no guard had ever led a team to the success the Bulls had in the 1990s. While he seemed to be the logical descendant of Elgin Baylor and Julius Erving, they never matched his success. Jordan won three titles with Luc Longley for goodness sakes.
But back to the winning. Here is a remarkable statistic that cuts right to the chase. Over his basketball career, including college, Olympics and the NBA, Bill Russell participated in 21 games which, for lack of a better term, can be called “winner take all” games. His record in those games: 21-0. In the NBA alone, Russell competed in 11 such games, 10 Game 7’s and one Game 5 in a best-of-fiver. The Celtics won all of them.
Jordan first played in a winner-take-all game in the NBA in 1988, his fourth year in the league, when the Bulls won Game 5 against the Cavs. They won another Game 5 the following year (“The Shot” against the Cavaliers) and then lost in 1990 to the Pistons in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals. The only other Game 7’s on Jordan’s resume were in 1992 (second round against the Knicks) and 1998 (Eastern Conference Finals against Indiana.) The Bulls won those as well.
That was Jordan’s time and while the Bulls didn’t dominate the way Russell’s Celtics dominated, they were pretty much unbeatable over an eight-year stretch. (They might well have won in 1994, without Jordan, save for a brutal officiating call against the Knicks in the second round of the playoffs.)
You couldn’t escape Jordan or the Bulls during that span. Cable television, ESPN, sports talk radio – all of that started to emerge or was emerging as the Bulls began their run. By then, of course, the NBA playoffs were televised and the Finals were in prime time.
But who saw Russell all those years, other than the fans at the games? There was scant television coverage. There basically was Johnny Most’s not-to-be-missed accounts from “high above courtside” and the newspaper morgues. That was it.
But they did play the games in the 1950s and 1960s.
Yes, you could argue that Russell benefited from a shorter season, not as much travel, a lighter playoff schedule. All of that is true. But Russell averaged an astonishing 42.3 minutes a game (second only to Wilt Chamberlain’s 45.8.) He battled Wilt, Oscar, Bob Pettit, Elgin and Jerry West on an annual basis. After Russell’s very first playoff game, Dolph Schayes, himself a future Hall of Famer, wondered how much Russell made and whether his team could put together enough cash to pay Russell to stop playing for five years.
I didn’t come to bury Jordan. I came to praise Russell. Michael deserves the accolades and the acclaim, but if the gold standard in sports is winning, and it should be, then no one was greater than Bill Russell. Twenty-nine years ago he was deemed the best in NBA history. Seems like a keeper to me.
The spin coming out of the Twin Cities now is that Ricky Rubio has a chance to grow, mature, develop and play at a high caliber in Europe for the next two years before joining Minnesota in 2011.
What, he couldn’t do that in Minneapolis?
Of course he could and, if Rubio really, really, really wanted to play in the NBA this season, he would be checking out the real estate in Minneapolis-St. Paul today. He has always been described as creative with the ball. He proved this week that he’s pretty creative without the ball as well.
The Timberwolves’ inability to get Rubio into the NBA this season has to be viewed as a major disappointment, president David Kahn’s comments notwithstanding. (At this point, I, like pretty much every NBA writer over the age of, well, never mind, can recall the days when Kahn worked in Portland covering the Blazers for the Oregonian. We all know him and like him.)
Minnesota used the No. 5 pick in the draft and, no sooner than you could say Fran Vazquez, found itself trying to work out a deal to get the kid across the pond. It was Rubio, or those acting on his behalf (more on that later) who, after all, had put his name in for the draft. That would seem to indicate he had an intention to play in the NBA for the 2009-10 season.
Rubio then said a move to Minnesota was too risky and complicated at this time, a somewhat stunning revelation given that he is guaranteed millions of dollars under the NBA’s rookie contract guidelines. As for complications, well, sure, Minneapolis ain’t Barcelona and Hennepin Avenue ain’t no Ramblas. And in two years, that will all still be true.
More to the point, the Euroleague ain’t no NBA and that is why Rubio’s decision doesn’t prepare him any more for entrance into the world’s greatest basketball league. It merely delays the adjustment. Maybe he’ll be better able to handle it at age 20 than he would be now, but that is of little solace to the Timberwolves.
It’s not like Rubio’s presence in a Minnesota uniform this season would magically transform the Timberwolves into a Western Conference power. It wouldn’t. Regardless of where Rubio plays in 2009-10, the Timberwolves are pretty much going to stink. Kahn understands that. Kurt Rambis understands that.
What Rubio’s presence in a Minnesota uniform this season would do is start the adjustment and acclimation process while introducing him to the ways of the NBA. In Minnesota, he would be working with the team’s strength and conditioning coaches on a daily basis. In Minnesota, he would be working with Rambis and the coaches. In Minnesota, he would be getting to know his teammates.
And in Minnesota, he would be getting the introduction to NBA 101, ranging from the travel to the back-to-backs to the long schedule to the nightly competition of the world’s best players. That is maturing, growing up and developing.
None of that will happen in Barcelona, where Rubio will be out of sight and out of mind, thousands of miles from Minnesota. To be sure, much will be expected of the kid from his new team.
By contrast, he would be under zero pressure to produce in Minnesota, where, insightful Timberwolves fans would understand, he would be getting groomed to play in the NBA with no great expectations as a rookie on a bad team.
This is what the Spurs did with Tony Parker, although Parker did not join a bad team. Initially, San Antonio coach Gregg Popovich didn’t even want to draft Parker. But he changed his mind after a second workout and Parker, at age 19, came to San Antonio, starting 72 games as a rookie. The rest is history. But do you think Parker would be where he is today had he chosen to stay a couple more years in France rather than work alongside Tim Duncan and David Robinson?
You have to wonder who has Rubio’s ear and who has his best interests at heart. Who stepped in after Kahn had worked out a complicated buyout from DKV Joventut and then proceeded to midwive the deal to Regal Barcelona? If Rubio truly wanted to play in the NBA, why was that not allowed to happen? (It may be possible he doesn’t want to play for Minnesota, which is another story for another day. He has not said as much publicly.)
He has an American agent (the universally loathed Dan Fegan.) He has European representatives. He has family and friends. Yes, it’s going to be more fun for the familia Rubio to have their son around. He will be rock-star famous in Spain whereas he’d be just another rookie in the NBA. He will be amply compensated in Barcelona.
But he will be no closer to being NBA-ready. That only comes from actually playing in the NBA. By staying in Spain he has delayed what Minnesota hopes is the inevitable. But in two years, who knows? The Wolves still hold his rights and he might be attractive trade bait. Or he might decide that Barcelona is just fine.
Either way, it’s not what Minnesota hoped when it made him a lottery pick last June. And the fact that Kahn went to the lengths he did to get Rubio to Minnesota indicates it’s not what Minnesota wanted or expected, either. He did about all he could, but, in the end, it wasn’t enough.
Either you believe him or you don’t. Either Rashard Lewis knew what he was doing or was a hopeless naïf.
You look at the body, and at the body of work, and you think that if Lewis did know what he was doing, then he didn’t do a very good job of doing it. He almost is the anti-Steroid poster boy at 6-10, 230 pounds (or so it’s listed) so, while an obvious candidate for bulking up, it never came to that. And his game logs from the playoffs reveal the good (34 points, 11 rebounds, 7 assists in Game 2 of the NBA Finals) and the not-so-good (6 points, 7 rebounds, 4 assists in Game 4 of the NBA Finals) only four days apart.
There were times in the conference semifinals against the Celtics when I wondered if Lewis was even aware there was a series going on. Then there were times when he was an absolute beast, a matchup nightmare for which Doc Rivers never did have an answer.
Frankly, I think it’s hard to make a case for Lewis as a deliberate evil-doer here. Maybe I’m the hopeless naïf – always possible – but if you had to identify a steroids miscreant on the Magic, Lewis wouldn’t even be under consideration. That’s what was so shocking about the revelation: it was the skinny Lewis who got nabbed, “one of the best people in the league,’’ according to Magic coach Stan Van Gundy.
Lewis has owned up to the transgression and he did so in an honest, thoughtful manner. I haven’t had a lot of face time with Lewis over the years, but when I did speak with him, he always was respectful and accommodating. While in Seattle, he was mentored by Ray Allen, as classy an individual as there is in the NBA.
His next NBA season will be cut short by at least 10 games, but this is really the first time that Lewis has been in any kind of hot water with the league. He can’t be blamed for agreeing to the ridiculous contract that Orlando offered him a couple years ago, but you could argue that he might have felt overwhelmed by the deal and the attention that he felt he had to do everything he could to live up to it. (That was A-Rod’s excuse in Texas.)
But Lewis said the banned substance was taken at the end of last season, which would explain the timing of the announcement. He said it came from an over-the-counter purchase of a powdered nutritional supplement and that he wasn’t aware it was in there. As he told the Orlando Sentinel, “I would never, knowingly, put any sort of substance or steroid into my body that is against the rules.”
At least he didn’t say he was blindsided.
And he also knows he’s subject to four random tests a year, all of which, presumably, he had passed in the past.
The NBA isn’t immune to these types of things; far from it. It tackled the drug problem head-on in the 1980s, but PEDs were not part of the dialogue back then. They are now and the NBA’s policy is quite clear: 10-game suspension for a first violation, 25 games for a second, one year for a third and ban for a fourth. The policy also stipulates that if a player comes forward voluntarily and admits to using a PED, there is no penalty.
Lewis may be the most prominent name, but there are others. Darius Miles was suspended for 10 games last season and, like Lewis, said he was unaware he had done anything wrong. Chris Andersen was kicked out of the league for two years, got his life back together, was allowed to return, and played so well he now has a new contract.
Lewis won’t be the last one and, for all we know, he’s not the only one. He just got caught. He made a mistake. He admitted he made a mistake. He apologized for it. He accepted the punishment. He has vowed to be more careful in the future over what he puts into his body. His organization has been supportive while also recognizing it has, as they say, a “teachable moment” before it.
In an utterly informal and unscientific poll, the Orlando Sentinel asked visitors to its web site to decide: was Lewis an innocent dupe or a cheater? Of the first 273 responses, 268 decided he was a dupe. So the fans are on his side. At least those fans.
We’ll have to wait for the memoirs to see what really happened. Did he actually feel any different? Better? Would he have continued using it if he hadn’t got caught? And no matter what he does the rest of his career, there will always be a line referencing the suspension, probably near the top, of any Rashard Lewis biographical web entry.
But, on the whole, Rashard Lewis has been, as Van Gundy said, one of the league’s top citizens over the last decade. In the court of public opinion, that should count for something. A whole career of staying out trouble should trump this one transgression.
In what qualifies as must-see regular season basketball in the NBA, there is no better matchup than the Celtics and Lakers.
Here’s a nugget you might not know: The Oklahoma City Thunder leads the NBA in inter-conference victories. Their victory Monday night in Atlanta pushed the surprising Thunder to 15-4 against Eastern Conference opponents. Not bad for a team which won only 23 games last season. They’ve won 23 already this season.
They slowly emerged on the NBA scene in the 1980s. They became mainstays in the 1990s. In the last decade, for the first time in league history, one of them became a Most Valuable Player and another became a Rookie of the Year. Two would earn Most Improved Player Awards and two others would earn Sixth Man Awards.
There is undeniable basketball DNA in Jonas Jerebko’s makeup.
There still are some impressive names due to hit the free agent market next summer. We all know the Big Three: LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh.
There’s a deadline looming in Rajon Rondo’s mind – and it’s not the one about which most NBA watchers are talking. It’s not about a contract extension for the slick Celtics’ point guard, who is beginning his fourth season in Boston. He claims that doesn’t occupy a single minute of his thinking.
As we enter Michael-Fest this weekend at the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, hagiography is blurring history a little.
The 