Archive for April, 2010

With the Suns beating the Trail Blazers in Game Six and advancing to the second round, a lot of the talk last night was about this being the first time Grant Hill advanced a round in the playoffs in his career, a fact that never occurred to me until last night. Grant Hill has had quite the career arc, beginning his career as a Co-Rookie of the Year with Jason Kidd, then facing extreme injury circumstances and finally reinventing himself on the Suns. Hill has shown himself to be the Suns best defensive player and last night in Game Six [...]

The 2008-09 Los Angeles Lakers accomplished something that hadn’t been done in 20 years: They became the first NBA Finals runner-up since the 1988-89 Detroit Pistons to win a championship the following season. If you were to look at the 20 championships won in the years between, you’d realize how big a part experience plays. Michael Jordan’s Chicago Bulls managed to repeat four times en route to six titles. The Shaq/Kobe Lakers did it twice on their way to a three-peat, and Olajuwon’s Houston Rockets did it once in winning consecutive rings in 1994 and 1995. Even the Tim Duncan-led [...]

In game four of the Bucks vs. Hawks series, Brandon Jennings show a variety of finishes on the way to scoring 23 points. Being a point guard in the NBA, you are going to need a lots of different finishes to avoid getting your shot blocked. Steve Nash is a master of this. iHoops dedicated an entire article to this very thing, finishing. As you’ll notice in the video clip, Jennings uses a mixture of floaters and runners to throw off the timing of shot-blockers. For being such a young player, it is impressive the skill that Jennings has when [...]

For those of you looking for more video breakdowns, more will be up later tonight and tomorrow so keep your eye out for that. In case you missed previous ones, be sure to visit: Anderson Varejao with a big assist to Lebron. A look at Kobe’s footwork. Manu Ginobili making plays against the Mavericks. Russell Westbrook big time athleticism. For today, a few quick thoughts about the playoff series thus far and how I think they’ll end up: EAST Cavaliers vs. Bulls (Cavs. lead 3-1) – What can you really say? LeBron is the best player in this series and [...]

It is certainly a new day for point guards in 2010 and no longer a position that is played strictly below the rim. Russell Westbrook showcased last night the new wave of small guards coming through and made a spectacular play that may have had significant implications on how Game Three between the Oklahoma City Thunder and Los Angeles Lakers played out. Let’s go to the third quarter. The Lakers had a tight hold on the game, with two minutes left, LA led OKC by eight points when Westbrook was advancing the ball near mid-court with Derrek Fisher guarding him. [...]

Manu Ginobili has long been one of my favorite players in the NBA to watch. The manner in which he plays the game as well as the emotion he plays it with are aspects that have drawn me in. There’s no getting around the fact that Manu plays with a certain flair and unorthodox that works for him. As the Spurs fought to tie their series with the Mavericks up at one game a piece, Ginobili scored 23 points. Let’s take a closer look at some of Ginobili’s field goals (Live video at the end of post). The first play we’ll [...]

There are a lot of aspects of Kobe Bryant’s game which have made him one of the greatest shooting guards of all-time. Like him or not, you have to give Kobe his due for putting hours upon hours in the gym and devoting himself to the fundamentals of the game. What I am going to show you in these next two video clips is something I feel has elevated Kobe’s game in the second half of his career – footwork. As the Lakers took a 2-0 lead in their series with the  Thunder, Kobe finished with 32 points in Game [...]

Wow.

My Fansided colleague, Drew Decker, wrote a post last August on basketball website Sir Charles In Charge listing who he felt were the league’s 10 worst general managers. While I agreed with most of his list, I took exception to a couple of names—most notably, the Milwaukee Bucks’ John Hammond. Decker and I exchanged opinions until we agreed to disagree. My contention was based on what I perceive to be a general manager’s No. 1 priority, and that’s doing what his owner asks of him. At the time that Hammond traded Richard Jefferson to the Spurs for expiring contracts there [...]

Ed Davis, a 6’9 Sophomore Forward has declared for the NBA draft according to the University of North Carolina. Davis’ Tar Heels had a disappointing season and although Davis had solid numbers (12.9 points, 9.2 rebounds, 2.7 blocks per game), his individual sophomore season was also considered a disappointment after he showed flashes of brilliance as a freshman. Davis is very raw and is still a while away from really becoming a contributor, but he is still considered a lottery pick. Davis is unlikely to pull out of the draft. (Andrew Melnick is Howard the Dunk’s lead blogger and a [...]