From the AP: Before the injury, Irving was the runaway favorite to win the Rookie of the Year award and was having one of the best seasons for any rookie point guard in recent years.
Kendrick Perkins has gained some national attention recently thanks to his strong words about LeBron James’ twitter reaction to Blake Griffin’s play-of-the-year dunk on Perkins, and his feelings towards “elite” NBA players on twitter in general.
From the New York Times’ Howard Beck, via Steve Adamak: Anthony’s struggles this season have been well-documented: he is currently behind only LeBron James and Kobe Bryant in usage rate, but he’s shooting just 39.4% from the floor and 30.3% from beyond the arc, he’s been a ball-stopper, and the Knicks are currently one of the worst offensive teams in the league.
According to multiple sources, the Cleveland Cavaliers will start undrafted rookie Mychel Thompson tonight in place of Anthony Parker, who is out with a back injury.
From the New York Post’s Marc Berman: D’Antoni said that the athletic Shumpert’s best position will be at the 2 or the 3 going forward, and that one of the Knicks’ main offensive problems is that the team has been settling for three-pointers instead of setting up Tyson Chandler with looks inside.
From the Trail Blazers’ official twitter: Batum found his groove for the Blazers after a slow start, and the 23-year old forward is currently averaging 11.2 points and 4.2 rebounds per game with a career-high PER of 17.47.
If you’ve taken a drink every time a national TV broadcaster has referenced Miami Heat forward LeBron James’ “improved post game” this season, there’s a good chance your liver hates you.
Grantland’s Robert Mays has a cool story up today on how one man with an obsessive love of NBA box scores allowed the invaluable basketball database basketball-reference.com to put every box score in NBA history on its website: For the rest of the story on Pfander’s fascinating life-long obsession with recording NBA box scores, click through and read the full story -- I’ll be on basketball-reference and seeing if Russell really did force Wilt to struggle every time their teams went head-to head.
Washington Wizards interim head coach Randy Wittman has just announced that starting power forward Andray Blatche will miss the next 3-5 weeks with a calf strain.
Derek Fisher isn’t the fastest point guard in the league, or the best passer, or the best finisher or the best ballhandler, and he’s not even much of a shooter off the dribble.
From the Orlando Sentinel’s Josh Robbins: The Magic asked the league if they could simply stay in Orlando and fly to Indianapolis on the day of the game to play the Pacers, but the league shut that down out of the fear that the flight would get delayed somehow and the game would have to be cancelled.
The Los Angeles Clippers held the lead over the Lakers for most of the game on Wednesday night, but were unable to put the game away at any point, and ended up succumbing to the Lakers because of Pau Gasol’s aggressive play and yet another late-game takeover by a Mr.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Clippers coach Vinny Del Negro has announced that Chris Paul will start in tonight’s game against the Los Angeles Lakers: Paul has missed the past 5 games with a hamstring injury.
Since the Lakers hired Mike Brown in the off-season and abandoned the legendary triangle offense, the team has fallen from 7th to 16th in the league in offensive efficiency.
From ESPN.com’s Marc Stein: Ostertag, who was a solid if unspectacular NBA center for 11 seasons, said that he regrets retiring at the age of 33, and that he wants people to know that his time in the D-league was not “a publicity stunt.”
The Miami Heat won’t have Dwayne Wade tonight against the Lakers, and LeBron James will apparently be a game-time decision, but they may get some help Eddy Curry, who might play in his first game since 2009 tonight: From Yahoo!
From Hoopsworld’s Lang Greene: If Felton wants a long-term deal with the Blazers or any other team, he’s either going to have to take a large pay cut or start playing a lot better.
From Kerry Eggers of the Portland Tribune: As Eggers notes, Marcus Camby, Greg Oden, and Raymond Felton will all be free agents after this season, and if Wallace opts out, it could cost a combined $17 million or more to keep both of the team’s small forwards on the team next season.
