You and me could write a bad romance.

The Suns
First off, the (kinda old) video that brought me back to the blog:

As this person says, the Phoenix Suns are probably the most fun-loving team in the NBA. Hence, my love for them.

Amare on kids radio!

Maybe Goran can be the Point Guard of the Future!



Lakers v Suns
Tonight is making me hate the Lakers even more. Fouling Grant Hill so hard that he loses his contact and requires stitches. Lou Amundson getting flagrently fouled and not getting the call, causing Alvin Gentry to be ejected. Evil usually wins, I guess.

As a pick me up, have a picture of a napping Earl Clark:














(Courtesy of Jared Dudley's twitter account.)


Mystics News
It's not actually news yet, but on Tuesday the Mystics are having a press conference to announce an apparently awesome new signing. My guess is Katie Smith, which would be super good, but I'm also holding out hope that it's Deanna Nolan (even if she's not a free agent). I don't think it could possibly be Penny Taylor, and she's the only other option of this magnitude.

So I guess we'll see...

I'm not internationally known

WNBA
I think I helped break the internet a little. Thank you to Henry Abbott for adding to the respectful discourse about the WNBA.

With her eyes on Olympic Gold, Lauren Jackson plans to not play for the WNBA in 2012.

The Suns
Barbosa is back in Phoenix. He may see playing time this week, but don't bet on it. He did apparently have a nice no look pass in practice though. Yay for seeing the court (or not seeing it) well! Also, it looks like his mother is still sick, but on the upswing from a very bad lung infection.

Amare is back at practice and still wearing his goggles. Barnes is playing with the starters in scrimmages in place of Hill. And Alando is having trouble with his hamstring. Before that though, he was performing at a high level.

More on the Suns' new identity. I'm still holding my breath.

The Suns played an outdoor game last Saturday night against the Nuggets in Indian Wells, California. The result? It was cold and windy. Oh, you mean you want to know the score? 77-72, Denver. Honestly, which team did you think would win a cold outdoor game?

The only really exciting thing was a pair of blocks by Lopez that almost literally knocked my socks off. Well, those were the only notable moments unless you like watching Raja Bell walking around with his arms completely inside his jersey in order to keep warm.

Other NBA
Looking for work? Don't knock on Stern's door.

I got more records than the KGB

The Suns
10 questions about this Suns' season: Arizona Republic, East Valley Tribune

Insight into Porter's playbook (now with muddled metaphors!)
“I’ve never been a big believer in having 10,000 plays and then wind up only running five of them,” he said. “I’m more of a believer in having just a few, making sure those plays have a lot of wrinkles and options.”
The Suns spent an hour ironing out the wrinkles on one such play in Wednesday’s morning session.
So are wrinkles good? Or bad?

Also from that article:
When the Suns broke the huddle under former coach Mike D’Antoni, they chanted "Suns!" Under Porter, that mantra has changed to "Defense!"
I'm cautiously excited about seeing how they do with this defense oriented approach.

More on Porter's defense and how players are adapting to it.

Nash is in favor of fewer minutes, but not fewer games.
"If I could miss 10 or 12 games and go to the Bahamas, that sounds good," Nash said. "If I have to stay here, I might as well play. But to shift the minutes around a little more and change our style just a little bit to preserve guys' legs ... I think that's possible."

I'm just ridiculously in favor of there being backups for Nash that might let Barbosa return to his natural position. The man just doesn't see the floor well, and that's ok. You'd never ask Nash to post-up, or Shaq to start jacking up threes, so why is it a problem if LB is a (really good) undersized shooting guard?

Speaking of Barbosa, he left training camp to be with his very ill mother in Brazil. My thoughts are with them.

Also in that article:
The players [ran] gassers for every missed free throw.... "I have to change that around because they didn’t run that many," [Porter] said. "There were too many free throws made."

Diaw poked STAT in the eye and now Amare may wear goggles for the rest of his career. It isn't serious, but he's just a cautious guy.

Also in that article: Barbosa hasn't set a date to come back from Brazil yet. The Suns do not expect him back before next week, at the earliest.

A fairly nay-saying look at the upcoming season. Some positive bits, but also featuring many phrases in the vein of as if his feet are nailed to the floor and collection of dinosaurs.


Other NBA
Photo from the Plain Dealer
Information about Anderson Varejao, his off season, and his ankle injury.
The injury also prevented Varejao from playing for Brazil in an Olympic qualifier. Surprisingly, he received criticism in his own country for sitting out the qualifier and rehabbing his ankle.
How is this surprising?

"What was tougher for me is the media in Brazil didn’t know what was going on," Varejao said. "I didn’t know why. Everybody started talking like I didn’t want to play for the national team. That was tough. Brazil is a soccer country. Basketball is not that big, so they didn’t really know what was going on."
No, really, I think that even if they had known why he didn't play for Brazil, they would have been disappointed. Especially b/c he played in the playoffs even with the sprain. And claiming that basketball fans around the world don't know about it when their favorite player is injured? Is shortsighted in the age of the internet.

Varejao said the ankle is still swelled a little, but not as bad as it was.
Which, aside from some questionable grammar, is both good and bad. Obviously.

The Spurs count their blessings and come up with three.

Lawrence Pedowitz's review of the NBA's referees has been completed. He found that Donaghy was the only ref who acted illegally. But, as Donaghy's attorney, John Lauro, points out: "If this had been an independent investigation we would have gladly cooperated," Lauro told ESPN.com's Mike Fish. "But we knew this was going to be a PR effort. ... It is a way that David Stern can say, 'I put nice little ribbon on this whole case and the only person that has ever done anything incorrect is Tim Donaghy.' That really was the whole purpose of the report."
I gotta say, I agree. I'm on the fence about if there are other refs who were fixing games or doing things that were worse than favoritism, but I don't trust Stern at all.

The Warriors' mascot is named Thunder. The new OKC team is the Thunder. Conflict!
"For the sake of not making things confusing, we're going to do something. We just have to figure out a good exit strategy."
He just might have one -- leave Thunder in China during the team's upcoming trip to Asia.
"He might get lost in the crowd over in China," Rowell said. "There are 1.3 billion people there."


General WNBA
Lauren Jackson will be a free agent and the Storm are bound and determined to keep her. Also, no matter what the title of the article says, she doesn't want to think about the issue yet.


WNBA Finals
You may be able to stop Nolan, but the Shock have more options than that. For instance, they have Taj McWilliams-Franklin. And other veterans like Katie Smith. Also, the awesomeness of Bill Laimbeer. But mostly, they have Taj.

Doris Burke's diatribes about how the Mystics are eeeeevil for trading Taj to a contender have been bothering me a lot during ESPN's coverage of the Playoffs. I'm glad that someone else put it into words. If I had tried, it might have come out as *keyboardsmash*

I would also add that the Mystics picking up a 8.3ppg/3.7rpg 22 year-old rookie center (in Humphrey) is a lot better for rebuilding than the Grizzlies picking up a 4.8ppg/4.9rpg 26 year-old center who has been playing professionally for 7 years (in Kwame Brown). So please don't even begin to compare this to the Gasol trade, Ms. Burke. Thank you.

Mr. Dinkins, would you please be my mayor?

Again, it's been awhile since my last update. This time it's because I was very sick for about 2 weeks. Blech. Some older links are mixed in here, mostly because I found them interesting and/or important. Enjoy!

The Suns
Saturday's Game One loss against the Spurs was pretty hard to take. To lose a 16 point lead and have it go into two overtimes (one of which happened on a 3-pointer from a 7-footer) before finally losing on a last second shot? Just really hard to swallow. In the post game interviews, the Suns all looked so sad. Shaq was barely audible, and Hill looked like he probably had been crying. It broke my heart.

May Tuesday's game go much better, without dumb fouls and dumber luck.

Game recaps: Associated Press, Arizona Republic, East Valley Tribune

It looks like Diaw is key for this first round matchup (and in my mind, the entire playoff run).

Unrelated to the playoffs, Barbosa met Shaq first when he was 7 years old. They shook hands, and then Shaq broke LB's gym's backboard. It didn't get fixed for a week and a half.

Other NBA
Apparently the new owners of the Sonics had no intent to keep them in Seattle, no matter what they told the NBA or the previous owner. I know this is old news, but it's important context to the fact that the NBA team owners approved the Oklahoma City relocation. A few things stood out to me in the second article.

One: Clay Bennett hopes no one understands the concept of context. Bennett said his words had been misinterpreted. When he wrote, "I am a man possessed! Will do everything we can," he meant he was determined to find a way for the Sonics to remain in the city. Ha!

Two: Bennett is...facing a class-action lawsuit brought by season-ticket holders who say they were duped into buying tickets under the premise the Sonics wouldn't leave. Crazy!

Three: And this week former team owner Howard Schultz announced plans to sue to get the team back, saying Bennett did not make a good-faith effort to secure a new arena deal as he promised when he bought the team in 2006. I'm glad *someone* is paying attention to the emails from the first article, since David Stern seems to be so prone to flattery. Even if Seattlites don't like Schultz either.

The Nuggets had major bus problems on the way to game one. Bad omen there with black smoke and everything.

Isiah Thomas finally got fired, but he's been kept around seemingly for kicks. My friend Anna suggested that this may be to avoid paying out the nose to let him go. Whatever it is, I'm glad he's (mostly) gone to stop the poisoning of that franchise (and the league as a whole).

FIBA and Other International Ball
Here, have an overview of Olympic qualifiers and the Olympic games themselves.

Brazil is optimistic about their chances to get through the Olympic qualifiers. I'm definitely rooting for them.

Tiago Splitter's sister, Michelle, has been dealing with leukaemia for awhile, and recently had a recurrence. I hope her health improves.

Shabtai von Kalmanovic treats the members of his basketball team (Spartak) really really well. That includes Dianna Taurasi, Sue Bird, and Tina Thompson. He has a little more than a smidge of smarm though.

Becky Hammon signs with the Russian national team to play in the Olympics. This was weird to me, until I read that article. She's right, her choices were to sit on my couch and watch the Olympics, or play in the Olympics. It made it an easy decision.

The WNBA
The WNBA draft happened while I was not busy maintaining this blog. It was a pretty awesome (if semi-predictable) draft, and the Mystics got a pretty good (and local!) pick-up in Crystal Langhorne.

The Seattle Storm (who are my preseason guess for a championship) recently entered into a sponsorship deal with Olivia Cruise Line. This is (probably) due in part to their off season pick up of Sheryl Swoopes (longtime spokesperson of Olivia). This is the first time that I know of that a WNBA team has officially entered into any kind of partnership with a high profile member of the lesbian (or gay) corporate community. However! Their press release on this cracked me up and not in a good way. The only time that they mentioned anything about the GLBT nature of Olivia was when they mentioned famous personalities that had been involved with the company in the past (and present). Entertainers and athletes aligned with Olivia have included stars such as Melissa Etheridge, Heart, KD Lang, Missy Higgins, Paula Cole, Billie Jean King, Martina Navratilova and the Storm’s own Sheryl Swoopes. No other GLBT mention, even though olivia.com literally announces that it's "Where Lesbians Go."

The New York Liberty are going to play an outdoor game this year. It marks the very first regular season game of it's kind in pro-ball. Male or female.

Tamika Catchings is working hard to rehab from last year's torn Achilles Tendon. She wants to help win the Fever a championship, and she really really wants to play in the Olympics.

WNBA Transactions:
* Nikki Teasley, who was my favorite Mystic two years ago and who I still love a lot, is pregnant. I was all excited for her, b/c a little Mystic baby! But then she got let go, for reasons that had nothing to do with her pregnancy. Raise your hand if you believe that. No, me either. Pretty crummy.
* Former Mystic, Stacey Dales retires from the Chicago Sky to focus on broadcasting.
* The Minnesota Lynx picked up Ashley Awkward. This is mostly notable because my sister will love her name. She came from Australia's WNBL, and it'll be interesting to see how she does in the WNBA.
* Sue Bird re-signed with the Seattle Storm.
* Yolanda Griffith gets signed to the Storm. Yes, they're collecting fairly old players, but I have the feeling that they're going to be really good.
* The Phoenix Mercury lock Dianna Taurasi down for another three years.
* The Mercury sign Yuko Oga from Japan. I don't know much about Japanese women's basketball (they'll be in the Olympic qualifiers in Spain in June), so I can't wait to see her play.

Pour myself a cup of ambition

Geez, it's been a little bit. This is going to only cover through Tuesday for the most part, and only the NBA. I'll have another post up soon (hopefully today) with WNBA and FIBA as well as stuff from last night. Sorry, I know all two of you wait with baited breath for these posts.

The Suns
Win number four was terrific on Saturday night. I didn't get to listen or watch stats, but a friend (smileyqueen114) was at the game and she texted me with excitement and awesomeness. For instance, did you know that it was the Gorilla's birthday on Saturday? Neither did I. Happy 28th, Go!

Win number five wasn't too shabby either. They're really playing well and having fun and earning the respect of their opponents. I seriously couldn't ask for more.

Recaps: Associated Press, Arizona Republic, East Valley Tribune

With those wins, the playoff picture looks a lot better.

Monta Ellis wants to have a race with Leandro Barbosa. Ok, so maybe he doesn't *want to* per se, but he definitely talked about it.

Bell's defense has gotten markedly better lately. I really think that he missed Marion when the trade first happened. Or as he put it: My energy level personally went through a little down period when that trade happened.

Whaddya know, the Boris Diaw that won the Most Improved Player in '06 still exists somewhere in there. Maybe he's trying to win it again this year. He's thinking, if I take every other year off and really step it up in the even numbered years, that award is mine! Ok, maybe not.

Permit me some Sports Night quoting for this next link.
JEREMY Not fitting in is how qualified people lose jobs.
ISAAC Yeah, but a lot of time it's how people end up working here.
I just love my team!

I worry about articles like these. It just sounds like Marion all over again. I'm not saying he doesn't deserve to be mentioned in the same sentences as Lebron and Kobe and KG, but I just... When I hear him say things like, I put in the time and the effort and the work to be an elite player and ... my teammates and coaches notice, even if other people don't notice it, it's like listening to Marion talk last summer. And that scares me a bit.


Other NBA News
Shawn Marion was out for two games because of back problems (or if you read comments on azcentral.com, because Pat Riley wants to get a good pick in the draft lotto). What I want to know is: was he in a car when he backed into an object in a garage? Because I really didn't read it that way, and I laaaughed.

One of the reasons that I was unable to listen to the Suns beat the pants off the Kings on Saturday night was because I was at the Wizards v Clippers awesomefest. Seriously, I wanted to shake some sense into all those people who left before the end of regulation. Let that game be a lesson to them. Four points in seven seconds to take it into over time! And Chris Kamen on the kiss cam! Awesomesauce!

Arenas thought he'd be back this week, but then on Monday the doctors said not yet. Who knows when he'll be back. If he doesn't come back this season, he might not come back to DC at all. I'm not sure that's a bad thing.

The Rockets lost! Finally!

The Nuggets score points like it's going out of style. I care very little about either team, so that article is going to stand on it's own.

The Seattle SuperSonics and Oklahoma City reached a preliminary agreement on a lease at the Ford Center, pending NBA approval of the team's move. Considering how Stern seems to feel about Seattle, it looks like a pretty definite move.

*puts on armchair psychologist hat* This guy seems like he's running from something. But he'll have great stories when he stops running.

You can't step into the same river twice

The Suns
Thursday's game was a big win. I didn't get to see a lot of it, but I appreciate that even after (or while) adjusting to Shaq, they can still get out there and play small ball with the Warriors.

All that, and 4 technicals. I kind of love that (as an isolated incident), because it shows an injection of spirit into the team that's been lacking this year. I hope it continues, although without the Ts. I also really love the bit in that article about the triangle offense. D'Antoni finally says what I've been thinking since I heard of it: Any time anyone has three guys on a side of the court, someone can call it a triangle. Exactly!

Game recaps: Associated Press, Arizona Republic, East Valley Tribune.

Shaq is an pretty good playmaker. In his words, the great John Wooden said the true definition of a great player is how you make everyone else play around you, so it's my job to take (my teammates) to the next level.

Barbosa knows his shortcomings, and wants to work on them. His goal? To be number one in steals for the league. I have nothing but ridiculously positive things to say about that.

Shaq sends the bench scattering in the game against the Grizzlies. I love stories about what happens on the bench, and I love to see these guys poke fun at one another. This article gave me the warm fuzzies.

There's more about that in this article about Gordan Giricek. Highlights for me included Shaq apologizing to the man who split his lip when Shaq dove into the stands, and Iavaroni coining the word Shaqlimated. I already had been using Shaqceptance, this is a great new one to use. Thanks, Marc!

Other NBA News
Caron Butler comes back, is the leading Wiz scorer, helps win a game against the Cavs, and turns 28. All on the same day. I hope he plays again on Saturday against the Clippers when I'm there watching.

LeBron James is on a very misguided Vogue cover.

FIBA and Other International Stuff
Nene is recovering, doesn't know how he'll be for the Olympic qualifiers this summer, and really likes God. A lot. If that's how he gets the strength to beat cancer, more power to him.

Glendale, Arizona wants to become the home of USA Basketball. No big surprise, Jerry Colangelo is pushing for that to happen.

Apparently, Switzerland attracts Brazilian basketball players. Who knew?

The WNBA
The Mystics are helping to sponsor a walk to raise money for people with breast cancer. It's May 11th at 9 am. It sounds very cool.

WNBA Moves:
* Bo Overton has resigned from his post as the head coach and GM of the Chicago Sky amidst allegations of sexual harassment. I hope we get more news on that. Steven Key, formerly assistant coach, has been named GM and head coach.
* The New York Liberty have re-signed Janel McCarville and her faux-hawk.

Is he strong? Listen, bud.

First things first: LEANDRO BARBOSA HAS A BLOG. *ahem* Ok, now for the rest.

This is almost a week old, but I wanted to put it in here in case I wanted to find it later. Nash really really wanted to play with Shaq.

Yesterday I talked to someone who kept insisting that I had to hear what Shaq was saying about Bill Walton. But I couldn't find it anywhere. Tonight I found it, and it was worth the anticipation.

Any little crack in the armor can cause disruption. I don't want to be the crack in the armor. I want to be the extra coat on the metal. Boy, Shaq sure likes his extended metaphors.

The pluses and minuses of playing with Shaq and without Marion.

I have been (clearly) having the "can Shaq still play?" conversation with a lot of people lately. One thing that I keep bringing up is the amazing training staff at the US Airways Arena. I'm glad that this finally got addressed in the media with regard to Shaq. Now I feel less crazy. About that, anyway.

There's not a very good chance that Shaq will play tonight against the Warriors. He might play tomorrow against the Mavericks (though I doubt it). Most likely is that they would wait until after the All Star Break and have him play in the game against the Lakers. As an aside to this, I'm kind of pissed that he would find it funny to put down Erick Dampier by comparing his play to the WNBA. What is he, seven? "Hey, Dampier! Shaq says you play like a girl." WTF?

I'm so nervous about tonight's game. Apparently I'm not the only one. Facing the Warriors all depleted? Ugh.

While I'm not a Wizards fan, I do have an appreciation for them. I hope that Arenas coming back helps them, but I'm more eager to see Caron come back.

This is crazy. I wonder what he thinks of Donaghy. It's probably not safe for work or small children. Just a guess.

All Star Weekend from a WNBA perspective. Yay for Nikki Teasley being involved!

An interesting article on how women's college coaching is changing because of the WNBA.

A few videos:

Jeff Green misses a dunk in the Sonics @ Suns game on 2/8



Wally Szczerbiak calls a time out when his team doesn't have one, making the Suns glad that that rule has been changed since 1976.



A WNBA/The L Word fanvid that has a song that keeps getting stuck in my head (stupid Gwen Stefani). It's mostly up here to show my sister, but I think it's fun--so there.

And I said "Rhino...stop making things up."

I have been writing lists of links about basketball (mostly the Suns and the WNBA) in digest form and sending them to my sister almost every day. Recently I had the thought that maybe I should start posting them here, so other people could access them too.

So here goes, my first posted digest. Hopefully I'll have them up every day or so.

An interview with Mike Jones, an American playing pro ball in Iran. I rather enjoyed his emphasis on how friendly people there are and his description about what there is to do for fun. Surfing the internet ten hours a day instead of two. Hee. It was kinda cool that he wants to stay there (if the money is right).

I don't understand this. How can Chris Kaman play for Germany just because it's where his great grandparents were from? Doesn't he need to live there? Or have a passport already? Or at least citizenship? My head hurts from thinking about it.

France wants to host the 2014 FIBA World Championships. It's interesting to see how FIBA is picking this, since Japan (the site of last year's games) isn't exactly a basketball powerhouse. It would be pretty cool for the French national team to have it at home though.
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Boris Diaw answers 6 questions. He talks about basketball, movies, books, and photography. It's interesting (and rather gleeful) to me that he talks about his international basketball experiences with as much importance as his NBA experiences. I mean, I want him to care more about the *Suns* than the French national team, but I love that he doesn't shortchange international competition in favor of the NBA. (Photo from suns.com)

The recap of Monday's Suns game against the Wizards from the East Valley Tribune. Of note to me: Barbosa has the flu (which makes so much sense as to how invisible he was). It was honestly a crappy win, but without Marion (anymore) and without Shaq (yet) it's a take what you can get situation.

Shaq practices with the Suns for the first time. He gets winded (of course) and probably won't play until the Lakers game after the ASB (of course). I did enjoy that he and Grant Hill were carpooling. It'll be a good way to save on gas, diesel or otherwise. He also admits to not being Superman (crazytalk!). As a result of this practice, some of his new teammates have strongly requested that the team reinforce the apparatus currently supporting the two baskets at the team’s practice court. After watching one of Shaq’s slams during his personal workout Sunday, guard Leandro Barbosa shook his head and said "Man, that thing is coming down."

Shaq is huge and Pete Wentz is pocket-sized.

Latrell Sprewell is in more trouble. The "best" part of this to me, is that this is the same boat on which he choked a woman without her permission during consensual sex. Oh, Latrell...

Because of some issues with the feed, I haven't posted here in forever. I think the issues have been resolved, and so now I just have to deal with the inertia of not writing for months.

The season has (clearly) started, and the Suns are doing great. This two game slide notwithstanding. (Although, can I just say, WTF is up with losing to the Timberwolves? I guess in an 82 game season the Suns can spare a loss, but still.)

On Friday I got to see them play live against the Wizards (in DC). It was very fun, I had terrific seats and they won 122-107. Plus Nash set a Verizon Center record with his 19 assists. I was sitting among a lot of fellow Suns fans, which caused my friend to remark that our section sucked.

Strawberry got big cheers from the crowd (even the Wizards fans) when he got to play in the fourth quarter, which wasn't too surprising but it made me smile. In a world where Grant Hill can get booed by Orlando fans, anything is possible.

(As an aside, those Magic fans really didn't have much cause to boo. Hill points out that his health was fine last season when he played 65 regular-season games. "I sat out a lot of games last year because the team wanted me to sit, not because I necessarily wanted to sit." From here.)

Also worth mentioning, this article is a good recap of the game, especially notable for the assist discussion and the sidebar about Barbosa's flagrant foul.

Know when to walk away and know when to run

I've been planning a post about Yi Jianlian, but now I'm not even really thinking about it. (Mostly I think this isn't an issue about him or even about the Bucks, but instead about the idiotic Chinese Basketball Association and Yi's management. They're trying to get more money and attention for their player at this point. Yay power plays. The end.)

I was also going to talk about the Mystics, but too bad if you wanted to read about that for now. I swear that I'll be trying to actually address them this summer, but for right now I'm a little distracted.

Because of Donaghy. There's not a lot that hasn't already been written about by people who are much smarter and some of them even y'know--get paid to write this stuff. But I wanted to link to some articles and blogs here.

First, Kevin Hench explains how I'm feeling as a Suns fan with amazing clarity. This paragraph, in particular, really resonated with me: If Donaghy is convicted of fixing any games over the last two seasons — during which the FBI was monitoring his games — how will Stern, who must have precious little credibility in Phoenix, ever convince Suns fans that they weren't the victims of a fix? I mean, besides the one he himself sanctioned after Game 4. (And if it turns out Donaghy did conspire to fix Game 3, how happy will Suns fans be with the FBI for allowing their team to be an unwitting victim in a two-year-old sting operation?)

I was not someone who was calling fix. I said that if Duncan and Bowen walked on that court following the Elson and Jones incident, they should have been suspended too. That's actually a call that I haven't seen talked about in the context of the Donaghy story, but plenty about Game 3 is.

This blog has a couple insights about Game 3, but is mostly interesting for the really depressing yet amazing youtube video that Brett Edwards centered his post around. It's a breakdown of some of the most notable terrible calls made in Game 3 (interestingly some were not made by Donaghy).

Fox Sports compiled some very interesting stats on Donaghy. Unless this turns out to be a widespread problem (and if that's the case I really hope Bavetta isn't involved), I am not someone who thinks that the NBA should have necessarily known what was going on. However, these stats are still really interesting to me.

Most of the players who have talked about this have been very careful about their words. Chris Sheridan asked Team USA about it, and the most riled up they got was LeBron James who said as a competitor, as hard as I play, it is disappointing, definitely.

Marc Stein at espn.com had a blog about more players' reactions (including Raja Bell and Steve Nash). They were asked about the whole situation (and were, again, toeing the party line) at The Steve Nash Foundation Charity Classic, which involved Barbosa. (Meaning that he seems to be recovering from his elbow surgery nicely. This is my considered opinion as a not-quite-doctor at all, but I'm being stupidly optimistic. I need to be in the face of all of this Donaghy crap.)

On a different note, as I was reading things about this whole mess, I read something else of note. At the bottom of his article about Team USA's reaction Chris Sheridan writes, I was able to glean one small piece of information regarding the trade the Phoenix Suns made with Seattle earlier Friday, sending Kurt Thomas and two future No. 1 picks to the Sonics in exchange for the second-round pick the Sonics acquired last week from Orlando in the Rashard Lewis sign-and-trade deal.

Turns out neither of the No. 1 picks the Suns surrendered has any lottery protection, which could make the 2010 draft pick especially valuable if the Suns' fortunes take a precipitous fall by then. The scuttlebutt around the league was that Phoenix GM Steve Kerr made the deal as the precursor to another deal, which he will make using the $8.092 million trade exception he acquired from the Sonics.

At that I literally shook my computer screen at disbelief. No lottery protection? That seems stupid. They had better have something pretty cool up their sleeves on this. I mean, yay dealing with some of the luxury tax, but seriously this seems like a really skewed trade. And not in our favor.

I bet Paul Coro is enjoying his vacation.

I just realized that Ray Allen is going to Boston, where there is no WNBA team for his daughter and him to support! And here I was all excited for him to be on a team with Allan Ray. Basically for no other reason than the symmetric silliness.

But I guess that he has more than enough money to go down to Connecticut (or anywhere else he wants to go) for a game. So that's something.

In international basketball news, I'm going to go to an entire day's games of the FIBA Americas! I get to see Brazil, USA, Argentina, Canada, Virgin Islands, Uruguay, Puerto Rico, and Mexico. It was affordable too.

Brazil has almost all of the major players accounted for. Nene has decided to stop being an ass about Team Brazil, and should be playing this summer. Tiago Splitter isn't yet playing for Popovich (who has a reputation for convincing his players not to play for their national teams), so he'll be there. Anderson Varejao is his usual excited self, and seems to be completely committed to the team.

Barbosa is a different story. He seems committed to the team, but I'm not sure if he'll be able to act on that commitment this summer. I was angry about how he was playing in the Spurs series, but as it turns out he was injured and in need of surgery. So I guess I owe him an apology.

The recuperation might interfere with the tournament, and also he has problems with insurance. I love the fact that he's made this a public issue in the press. Now granted, that article came out almost three weeks ago, but I haven't heard anything new on this subject. (Although FIBA is terrible at all things internet-related and it's not like the American press cares about international teams, so anything is possible.)

This all means that if insurance gets dealt with and he recuperates well, I could be seeing Leandrinho in August. Which, y'know, is all that really matters. Right?

(Also interesting, at least as a footnote, is his work with the college basketball system in Brazil. This is in huge contrast with Nene, who basically said, "fix it yourself.")

Emotional fuckwits!

I just woke up early from a dream that had me posting reasons that I'm angry at Barbosa. About how he's been lost and unable to connect on anything. Which is all true. And I am angry, but I think I'd rather not post about that.

I want to post asking why in a game like last night's, we played without Jalen Rose or Marcus Banks. A shooter like Rose with fresh legs? A player who has purportedly good D like Banks? Get them out there when we still had a lead. Rest the guys who looked so sloppy in the fourth.

I was so giddy and elated in the first half. It was like the team that I fell in love with last year in the playoffs was back. No one plays basketball like they did last year, not even this year's team. Last year everyone counted them out and they got so far playing such amazing and beautiful ball. They had so much to prove. This game was shades of that, and I really was excited to see them come out and do it again.

And then midway through the third they started getting tired. They started losing that beautiful lead. In the fourth when it was all gone, I thought I'd cry.

I don't know if I'm on the conspiracy bandwagon, that this was fixed by the NBA, but I can tell you that I think that it was an unfair ruling that did benefit the team that perpetrated the flagrant. I know that if Duncan and Bowen walked on that court following the Elson and Jones incident, they should have been suspended too. There is some bias in that, even if it's not intended to be game-fixing bias. If rules are rules and we should suck that up as Suns fans, then rules should be rules for everyone.

The latest I've heard about that (and this hasn't been confirmed, just word of mouth) is that Stu Jackson (NBA exec vp of basketball operations) said that Stoudemire and Diaw got their suspensions as a result of leaving the bench to participate in the near brawl, but that Duncan seemed to get up out of concern for Elson, and therefore wasn't suspended.

Do I really need to address that asshattery? No I didn't think so. (It does briefly bear mentioning that that's been Diaw's story about why he left the bench from the get go. He was worried about Nash.)

Whatever. I feel robbed by fate, frustrated by the outcome, and angry at Barbosa.

Tomorrow's game had better be awesome.

I'm 6-10, I'm in the lane!

Dear LeBron,
Your team just swept the first round of the playoffs against a very depleted team. The God pose might be a bit much. Just maybe.
Trying to be helpful,
Jean

I have been having a bit of trouble thinking of things to say about the playoffs lately. Mostly I just want to say that I so totally called the Warriors playing the Mavs hard and maybe even winning the best of seven. Everyone's acting so surprised about it, and I don't really know why. There are so many reasons that the Warriors can play so well against the Mavs.

The other thing that I want to say about the playoffs so far (that I have said and will say again long after I click the "publish" button) is "Eeep, Spurs!" Why can't Denver cooperate and just beat them for us? It's really scary.

I think it says a lot about the Lakers and how they're playing that I'm more worried about the second round than I am about the rest of the first. I just strongly feel that we'll win it even if the Lakers win tomorrow night (knock wood).

Oh, and I've decided that I'm not a Smush Parker fan. Not as though I was ever cheering for him, but he's pretty much sealed my opinion of him. Last Thursday, at the end of game three, he had that ridiculous dunk attempt. If you're up by six and there's a couple seconds left, you dribble it out. You *do not* run the fast break for an easy dunk. You just don't. It's rude and bad sportsmanship.

And then on Sunday he fouled Barbosa hard twice. Both times he basically grabbed him and took him into the stands. It was bizarre and unnecessary. And of course had me yelling at the TV. Because a) that's what I do, and b) I'm oddly protective of Barbosa.

One last thing about the Suns podcasts, and then I'm off to bed. It's mostly stuff (or maybe even all stuff) from the multimedia section on suns.com, but I love it! I've been having a ton of fun watching and listening to things that I never would have otherwise. Especially this.

Enjoy!

Here come the Suns

The Suns play game two with the Lakers tonight. I'm very excited, although apparently we haven't won a game two in the last five series that we've played. That's ok, I have faith that today they'll pull through with relatively few headaches.

And then tomorrow it's a double header of games that I care about (even if mostly marginally). First up Denver will hopefully beat San Antonio's ass again. Although I don't know how likely that is with the full court press of doom and the ability to completely control the tempo of the game. The Spurs defense has been written about by much smarter people than me, but suffice it to say that San Antonio worries me more than any other team in the playoffs, even Dallas.

Speaking of, in the second game tomorrow night we get to see if Golden State can win two games in a row in Dallas.

TNT is running a short little ad that makes me very happy. In it they call the team "Leandro Barbosa and the Suns." I know it's because of his team high 26 points, but still to have a bench player be treated by the media like he's the star of the team? Very cool. Also indicative of the way this team works together.

And! Indicative of the fact that Barbosa just got the 6th Man of the Year award. I suddenly can't remember if I had previously capitalized that or not. But whatever, I'm just so very excited that he got it. As a result, there's all sorts of press on him right now. He seems to have appropriate perspective on it too. He still has his focus on the Championship where it belongs.

I've recently started getting Suns podcasts from suns.com, both video and audio. So far they're very good. I may talk about them more later, I may not--but right now it's way past my bedtime. Goodnight, and good luck to our heroes.

A few articles and some talk of the Suns v Spurs

First of all, I'm linking to a few Barbosa articles that made my day yesterday (regardless of the outcome of the Spurs game).

This article is about the "race" for 6th Man of the Year. Mostly it's a nothing article, but the head to head stats at the end are kinda interesting. I didn't see anything too surprising or notable in them though. Just kinda interesting.

This one is also about the 6th Man of the Year award, but it has nice little details about Barbosa's path in the NBA as well as a kind of discussion about the difference between a bench player and a 6th man.

Basically, Suns coach Mike D'Antoni does not consider either Barbosa or Ginobili "bench players." A true sixth man, D'Antoni said, is just as valuable as any starter.

I had been arguing that for awhile, well at least to my former roommate and to my sister, but this article says it much better. I'm not sure anyone really would argue differently, but I get tired of there being such emphasis on being a starter.

This is basically Paul Coro saying, "I think Barbosa is great, you should love him too!" I do, Paul. Thanks. (There's not a lot more that can be said about that one, but it's still worth a read, IMHO.)

I also found a blog entry tonight about Raja Bell being a vegetarian from the time he was two and Boris Diaw being difficult.

Speaking of Bell and the Spurs game on Thursday, it struck me as odd that he was the highest rebounder (with 13) in the entire game. He's not a big guy like Duncan and Stat, and he's much more of a perimeter player than those guys. No other Suns player was even in double digits. I have no answer as to why or what it means, but it was weird.

Nash also didn't do as well as usual with his assists (7, which isn't shabby in general), and he had a bunch of turnovers (well, 6). I think it's because of the amazing Spurs defense. I mean, they kept us to 38% shooting. Obviously, if the team can't make the shots, then the passes for the shots don't count as assists.

I wish Amare had caught that beautiful would-be pass between Duncan's legs, though.

Sometimes when I look at box scores I get irritated with announcers. They kept saying things like, "and another Phoenix turnover..." Which lead me to think that the Suns must be doing really poorly in that regard compared to the Spurs. But no, it was about the same for both teams.