Nitro

When he isn't afraid to shoot, then yeah. But more often than not he passes down open opportunities, and besides his rebounding he didn't provide too much to the team last season. If cutting Miller means getting Chandler, Dalembert or Nene via FA, then they have to pull the trigger.

I like increasing the luxory tax. It will help dull down teams going way over the cap. Owners will still have that ability if they choose to, but it should eliminate teams with $40M more in payroll than franchises like the Kings.

I'm a huge Wade homer, but LeBron's the better player. LeBron is the more efficient scorer and has the versatility of being able to win games with his jumper, which isn't so much the case with Wade. Even though he holds the ball too much, LeBron keeps his turnovers lower than Wade, has better court vision, and his passes are more crisp and on point. Both are excellent rebounders for their positions. Both are also tremendous defenders, though LeBron is a little more consistent and makes less mistakes that can cost his team; though when Wade gives it 100% effort on that end and plays smart I'd say he makes the bigger impact. As for the whole clutch thing, LeBron made the bigger impact in those situations throughout the regular season and through the 1st 3 rounds. He didn't show up at all in the 4th quarter of the Finals, but overall last season his body of work in the clutch was better (or at worst, equal) than Wade's.

Big Black Cock.

Bingo. That's my boy.

I actually almost died tonight because of a deer. I was on I-195 (for people in Jersey, it's the highway which you get to Six Flags from) coming back from work, driving 75mph and because there are no lights on the road, I saw a deer standing right in the middle of my lane about 20ft before he would have hit my car. I slammed the brakes, swerved, spun out, and by some miracle by the time I was done spinning out I was in the shoulder facing the direction I was in before I saw the deer. If I hit that deer, a car in a nearby lane, or a tree, I would have likely been dead. Amazing.

Why does this deserve so much attention? He's gone. Maybe they'll let him back. And if they do let him back, having 2 topics and 7 pages (and counting) devoted to him is just gonna inflame his ego to the point no amount of Motrin and narcotic pain-killers will numb the pain.

I'd rank them... 1) Rajon Rondo. Ultimately, none of the Big 3 can be relied on as "do everything" offensive players anymore. In their primes, Pierce, KG and Allen could all dominate in iso situations, off-ball, score in different areas of the floor, and could also do a great job of setting up teammates (with Pierce and KG being able to have an entire offense ran through them). Now, those players can't, at least on a consistent basis. Rondo puts them all in perfect positions to be the most efficient offense in the league, while being dominant in open-court situations, and a terrific defender and rebounder for his position. *TIE* 2/3) Paul Pierce. Fact of the matter is he's the only consistent iso scorer on the team, and he's still one of the elite iso scorers in the entire league when he's relied on to do so. Off-ball, he's become a very efficient 3pt shooter, and as seen in the Knick series he can get unconscious from out there. He's still one of the better defenders at SF in the league, still a very good rebounder, and his passing is good enough that you can run an offense completely through him for large portions of important games. Lastly, even though Ray is the best clutch shooter on the team, Pierce is still their best clutch scorer, and their #1 option in those situations (unless they need a 3). *TIE* 2/3) Kevin Garnett. Still one of the very elite defensive players in the league, the best rebounder on the team, still is a capable 15PPG scorer, still a tremendous passer, and is the heart and soul of the Celtics. Unfortunately, out of the entire Big 3, he's had the sharpest decline, and on many nights his knees are just dead, and his rebounding and scoring ability take a huge hit. On the nights where he still has spring in his step, you can make a case for him being the most important player on the team. Those games are just too far and inbetween nowadays. 4) Ray Allen. Still extremely important, but IMO a distant 4th. Arguably the best 3pt shooter in the league, he definitely helps space the floor brilliantly for the Celtics, but ultimately he's less of a focal points and less well-rounded than Pierce offensively and defensively, and he doesn't make the same kind of impact offensively that KG does defensively/emotionally. I feel they'd have a much smoother time replacing him with Delonte West than replacing Pierce with Green or KG with Big Baby.

I'm on the fence with him getting banned. He was a troll, but he did provide some good topics, a lot of activity, and he wasn't all that dumb. He was extremely [expletive]ing annoying, which members who didn't like him could have simply pressed the ignore button on, but I think the benefits of having him here outweighed the negative.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vM3v5P8TY9M Mics get sandblasted..stab your abdomen with handcrafted pocket knife and spill your antacid..sprayed your mother[expletive]ing crib up when i ran past it..[expletive]ing felon..heading to hell in a handbasket.....talking shit will get YOU your GIRL and your MAN blasted...kidnapped and slapped in a van wrapped in saran plastic..get your damn ass kicked... by these fantastic ...furious four mother[expletive]ers flashing in front of your face without the grandmasters... [expletive].

Richardson was a better fit. Carter needs the ball in iso situations to be really effective, while Richardson works much better off-ball and is the better 3pt shooter. In the Steve Nash offense, Richardson was a near perfect fit at SG.

Lose in 5-6. They didn't have the depth or defense to take the Celtics that far.

There is nothing out there in FA that would get them to the playoffs, except maybe Tayshaun Prince or Caron Butler. They are desperately weak at the wing positions, and also lack any pure PG, so they should ideally trade Harris/one of their high-value PF's/Okur's big expiring contract (I believe it's expiring, anyway) for a really good player at one of those position, and a solid role player at the other. If they can pry an Iguodala, Gay, Ellis, Steph Curry, or Westbrook type player, that'd be a big start in the right direction, and with Harris/those PF's/Okur's contract they have that kind of value.

Some Nike's. Whatever shoe he was wearing last season was killing his feet and helping cause injury if I remember correctly, that Zig Zag bullshit or whatever. As for what kind of player would compliment him the best, I'd say either a really athletic PF that could run the floor and eat teams up in PnR situations, or a wing player that excels in iso and open-court situations. Kind of depends on if he can develop his scoring game...if he can get his volume up to over 20PPG on decent efficiency, I'd side with the big man. If not, I'd go with the wing player.

I don't know if I'd take Ben over Rodman, but it's damn close. He could do a lot of the things Rodman could defensively (and did those things in a similar way), but also could do things Rodman couldn't, which was truly anchor a defense with absolutely elite shotblocking. Prime Wallace was a 13-15RPG guy who blocked 3+ shots, had close to 2SPG (led the post-season 3x in that regard), and had the versatility and could defend PnR's like Garnett (not quite as well, but they are abilities guys like Dwight and Duncan don't possess to half that degree). To win 4 DPOY's in the same era as a prime Duncan and Garnett is absolutely insane, and in '04 he got robbed a 5th. He led arguably the greatest defense of all-time, has some of the best advanced defensive stats of all-time, and was just insane. As I said, it's close with Rodman, and guys like Hakeem, Duncan, Garnett, Russell and some other deserve a huge mention, but in one of the greatest defensive era's of all-time (early '00's) Wallace was IMO the best of the bunch.

http://www.bballone.com/benw/images/benwallace_main.jpg

As for the Stephen A. Smith thing...that's what happens when a man doesn't get his cheese doodles before the cameras start rolling. He rarely ever gets 1 on 1's. He's constantly double and triple teamed anywhere near the rim, and if he gets the ball low enough it's an automatic foul. Factoring in FT%, he is still disgustingly efficient from the field. And on a 3pt shooting team like Orlando, which generates a ton of long rebounds, I'd say that hurt his rebounding average, not help it. Who cares if he only has a 10ft range? That's all he needs. He's developed a nice little 10-15ft banked shot, improved his versatility in the post (very nice spin move, efficient hook shot, some added nuances with his footwork to get himself past his man in post/face-up positions, etc...), and he's still damn-near unstoppable within 5ft of the rim (which he gets to almost at will considering his strength, size and athleticism). He's no longer one dimensional. Yes, he gets too many turnovers and too little assists, which are both generated from the same problem (he rushes at times and gets careless on some moves). But bottom line is he scored with terrific volume and insane efficiency, is a top 2-3 rebounder in the NBA, is the most dominant defender in the NBA, and he's already proven that you can build a Finals team around him (when he wasn't as well-rounded as he is now). Yeah, he's by far the most dominant defensive player in the league...let's just throw that to the side and give him a minimal amount of credit for it in the overall picture because, as a C, he's not great passing out of the post.

Daye, Singler, Knight, Jerebko and Monroe are really the only ones who shouldn't be given up, only because of potential. Hamilton is not the same player he once was, is way overpaid and is unhappy. I think Prince is a very nice player, but he'd be more beneficial to a contending team, and he isn't a guy you build around. By the time they build a playoff-caliber roster, he'll be on the downside. Gordon is way overpaid and is a bad fit. Stuckey...meh, isn't a floor general and doesn't do enough elsewhere to warrant him being an untouchable. Everyone else is very, very expendable or just a terrible fit. And if no one else signs T-Mac, Detroit should bring him back next season for the minimum/close to it. Their best basketball of the season was when he was starting/getting significant minutes as a PG/point-forward, and he really made some of the younger guys look a helluva lot better than when Stuckey was running the show. Then again I'm a T-Mac fanboy so idk man wow....

I am nearly 100% sure there will be a season, even if it's only 50 games or so. The revenue lost and damage to the league from a lost season would far outweigh the differences being discussed in these negotiations over the course of x amount of years.

I mean, if I just heard that one quote without anything else involved, I'd interpret it as he doesn't know the team's identity or direction, or if they'll make a push for a 2nd superstar. Knowing Shaq it was probably him taking a shot at them, but if I just read that quote alone that's how I'd take it as.

It's a superstar's league, and ultimately if you don't have at the very least a top 10 player, you don't have a shot at a championship. There will never be NFL/MLB parity in the NBA. Far more than any other sport one player can win games in basketball, and there's only a handful of them. It's up to the smaller markets to draft these players and build wisely enough to keep those homegrown superstars, while the more lucrative markets have greater flexibility with the ability to sign/trade for those players...and really, it's like that in all sports. As for contraction, I love the idea in theory. Condensing talent will make for a better product (in terms of quality of basketball), period.

I actually don't mind the top 5, at least the players involved. Dirk/Paul over Kobe is sketchy. Dirk has always been underrated, and he constantly gets the Mavs to 50+ wins, and had an insane post-season last year to win the championship, so I guess that's passable. As much as I love Paul, and as much as he outplayed Kobe in the 1st round, he just didn't play dominant basketball for most of last season, while Kobe still gave his usual 25/5/5 and once again brought the Lakers homecourt advantage. LeBron/Wade/Dwight are without a doubt the top 3 players in the league, especially if this list is what to expect from next season. Anyone who calls Dwight overrated is crazy. He was absolutely dominant last season, finally polishing his offensive game up a bit. Blake's a little too high for my liking, but I feel people are quick to knock his rating simply because he has only 1 season under his belt on a team that didn't make the playoffs. He's a very good scorer, amazing rebounder, and great passer for his position. If he spruces up his defense a bit and continues to build on his iso scoring, he'll definitely be a top 10 player regardless of where his team ends up in the standings. Honestly, I didn't even bother looking through the list, and most other people already broke down some of the horrible rankings, so I'm done.

That's awful, but there's actually been a lot of famous studies done about how people can be robbed and killed in front of hundreds of people and not a single person do anything. People always assume another person will do the "right" thing, and it builds up to a situation like you see in that video. It's sad.

Couldn't have said it better myself. I think the Adelman signing is what really pushed it over the top for me and makes me really excited to see what this core can do together.

They need more explosive scorers from the perimeter players. Gay would have helped that, but also would have hurt that awesome perimeter defense they had last post-season. Conley was really solid last season, but I think getting a near all-star caliber PG who can truly orchestrate an offense and hit the 3 off the attention Randolph/Gasol will attract would really push them to the next level. Sucks they are in Memphis because CP3 would be perfect for this team (they'd have to give up Rudy, but last post-season shows he's expendable in some aspects, especially if they got a player like Paul).