Dwight Howard... magic.. The creativity, was absolutely worth staying up till 5 in the morning on my couch I loed Green's lit cupcake aswell, the guy's got air, on any other dunk contest Green could have possibly won it, but Howard just rose the bar so high.

he didnt even throw it down.

he threw the ball at the hoop.

iliked the cupcake and the candel

A few major trades made by the contenders in recent days:

Dallas gets: Jason Kidd and two spare parts
New Jersey gets: Devin Harris, DeSagana Diop , a few spare parts, and a 2008 and 2010 1st round picks

Cleveland gets: Ben Wallace, Joe Smith, Wally Szczerbiak, Delonte West
Chicago gets: Drew Gooden, Larry Hughes, two spare parts from the Cavs
Seattle gets: three scrubs (two from Cleveland, one from Chicago)

Watching Celtics at Suns. Intense match. Suns look fantastic. Thank god PP, KG and RA are all available. We're gonna need 'em. Gonna grab a new Pierce t-shirt before I go to the game on the 2nd when we're playing Atlanta.

don't forget to also pick up some 50% off pats gear.



losers

Wow. That sure develops the conversation. Thanks for your input CM.

Please respond to my post directed at you in the MLB forum. My curiosity regarding your loyalties remains.


Anyway:
\
We lost to the Suns but Celtics @ Portland was an incredible game. Great comeback for the Celts. Big lead on Clippers last night saw our key players rested. It was nice to see some of the other boys get some serious floor-time. I'll be at the game against Atlanta on Sunday. Very excited. Been a while since I've been to a live sporting event.

currently i live near cleveland so i'm a browns and cavs fan. i guess i'm a indians fan as well but i could care less about baseball.

I'd been wondering. You exhibit such strong feelings against Boston teams, it's nice to know where you're coming from for these threads. Appreciated.

Yao out for the SEASON


T-Mac will have to wait another year to get out of the first round of the Playoffs!

Yao out for a year just when Houston were on their hottest winning streak of 12 sws. Injured during the 13th game.....talk about unlucky.


As for Cleveland, our loss wasn't all that bad. One thing that made me happy was when Wally was missing all those shots, just watching the rest of the Cavs/coaches cheer him on still. Yeah we lost, but it was awesome see that they still had faith in each other and didn't allow a loss to break them apart. *cough Knicks cough*

Speaking of the Knicks...

New York 92 - 118 Orlando


Utter freakin' shambles, aren't they?

Kobe with 52 points, 30 in the 4th quarter and OT. Gasol was good too.
Dirk wasn't good enough and I still don't like Jason in that Mavs shirt. Come back to NJ.

I was at the Celtics/Hawks game today. Fantastic game. Very tight until the end. Some brilliant plays from Pierce, Garnett, Allen, Davis et al. The Hawks put up a serious attack though and it was gripping until the final minutes when we stretched the lead enough to feel a bit more comfortable. Got to get to more games!

As much as I like New Jersey, I am not all that unhappy about this deal. I was never that big of a Jason Kidd fan anyway.

i hate kobe, dude's a douchebag

Best player in the league though? I think so... There's all this talk about Lebron or Kobe getting the MVP this year, for me its all about Kobe.

24 points on 11 for 33 shooting? awesome job MVP. But we all know he's gonna win it becuase the NBA will give an "career achievement award" to kobe consisting primarily of running shaq out of town and "leading" the lakers to two 7th seeds.

22 in a row for the Rockets...


Who else thinks they still won't get out of the first round this year?

Me. I hope the Mavs end up playing the Rockets in the first round. I can see it now... "Red hot Rockets over-classed 4-0 by Dirk's Mavs"

Streak is over now though, Celtics with a great effort.

CP3 for MVP!

Im amazed at how well the Hornets have done this season compared to previous seasons...

Denver scored 168! 1!6!8! Against Seattle which is the 4th highest points total in NBA history. Good on them. Also, Boston completed the Texas Triangle but meh, who cares.

game..

contest. meeting. affair. encounter. showdown. bout. engagement. event.

Did it take you a month to find your thesaurus?

How the hell did we lose to the freakin Knicks...


Oh well, the Magic men have already wrapped up the third seed anyways!

Since there's no NCAA thread.


Kansas national champs!!!!!!!!!!! Unbelievable game!

N.B.A. approves Sonics’ move to Oklahoma
article taken from The Associated Press

SEATTLE (AP)—Those “Save our Sonics!” chants are now desperate pleas.

When NBA owners overwhelmingly approved the SuperSonics’ move to Oklahoma City for the 2008-09 season Friday—provided the team can settle its lawsuit with its hometown for the last 41 years—pain finally joined anger in Seattle.

“We’re not surprised, but it still hurts,” said Brian Robinson, head of the fan group “Save our Sonics!”

Robinson paid his way to New York, then at 6 a.m. Friday he began standing outside the Manhattan hotel where the NBA’s board of governors were meeting. He spent the morning staring down league owners on their way into the vote.

“The NBA doesn’t seem to be showing any concern for the fans of the market,” he said.

Sonics owner Clay Bennett tried. He said he was “honored” by the 28-2 vote by his colleagues for a move that will cost Bennett a $30 million relocation fee.

“I also want to express my regret to the citizens of Seattle and the fans of the Sonics that I was unsuccessful in bringing forth a new building,” Bennett said, addressing the issue of how genuine his effort was in Seattle.

“We tried the best we knew how to try and (I) did the best job I could,” Bennett said. “Seattle is a great city. There’s great fans. There is a great history.

“But decisions have now been made. … Now I turn my focus to Oklahoma City. And I’m thrilled,” said the financial capitalist, whose family is one of Oklahoma’s wealthiest.

Seattle officials were already on a full-court press to make the Sonics fulfill the final two years of its lease by playing inside KeyArena. Friday’s vote just increased the stakes.

The Sonics would be the third NBA team to change cities this decade. The Hornets went from Charlotte to New Orleans for the 2002-03 season. Vancouver lost the Grizzlies to Memphis in 2001.

“The Sonics have a valid lease with the city of Seattle through 2010. And we intend to enforce that lease,” Mayor Greg Nickels said at City Hall Friday. “We will continue with the litigation to ensure that they comply with that lease.”

There are three potential ends for Seattle:

— The U.S. District Court that will begin hearing the trial June 16 in Seattle over the team’s lease dispute could rule for the city and say the Sonics must play in KeyArena for the final two years of the lease.

NBA Commissioner David Stern said the league is prepared for the Sonics to play two more seasons in Seattle, if that’s what the court orders. He said the Sonics stand to lose as much as $30 million per season in that scenario.

The city’s hope is to keep the Sonics in town for two lame duck seasons, to buy time for a group led by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer to find an arena solution and eventually purchase the team from Bennett. Ballmer’s group already has proposed paying for half of a $300 million expansion of KeyArena.

— The court could rule for Bennett and agree with him that he can simply write a check to buy out the final two years of the lease so he can move the team this summer.

— Bennett could make a settlement offer so large, Seattle could not refuse it.

Seattle has already turned down Bennett’s $26.5 million buyout offer. Thursday, Nickels deflected questions about how large the offer would have to get before Seattle would consider it.

When asked Friday if he was expecting a new, richer offer from Bennett, Nickels said, “I don’t really care. We’re going to go into court in June.”

Bennett is going to try to avoid that.

“I am hopeful that we can re-establish communications and some sort of platform to have a meaningful, principled conversation,” he said. “We are certainly nowhere near that today.”

Bennett and the league have strong motivation to avoid the court case. Losing the trial would create an ugly, almost unprecedented scenario for the NBA of a team hemorrhaging money playing games in an area that has become openly hostile to its ownership. The Sonics are coming off their worst season in franchise history and already had fans staying away from games.

“You know, it will make the parting somewhat less amicable. But so be it,” Stern said of a move to Oklahoma in 2010.

Stern warned Seattle isn’t likely to land another NBA team anytime soon for the same reason the Sonics are leaving: the ongoing reluctance of state and local officials to help pay for a replacement for outdated KeyArena.

Nickels, meanwhile, questioned the NBA’s wisdom of moving away from Seattle’s metropolitan economy that is “larger than the entire state of Oklahoma’s.”

Stern responded that owners understand the move is from a larger market to a much smaller one, but the league “focused on the likelihood of success of the Sonics in Oklahoma City.”

Stern suggested that calling the moved club Oklahoma, instead of Oklahoma City, might be desirable because it reflects the importance of other parts of the state such as Tulsa in the franchise’s viability.

For the first time, Bennett responded to a planned lawsuit announced this week by the Sonics’ former owner, Starbucks Chairman Howard Schultz. Schultz is seeking to void Bennett’s purchase, accusing him of failing to act in good faith to find a Seattle arena, as the two had agreed during the sale.

“I operated in good faith. And that will be vetted through the trial and be clear,” Bennett said. “I was disappointed because I’ve had a nice relationship with Howard. … I made a commitment to him personally that was meaningful to me and I hail to that commitment.

“That’s another conversation I would like to have personally and perhaps resolve that as well.”

Bennett said his inclination is to leave the SuperSonics’ name, colors and history in Seattle. But he added that could be a bargaining chip in his negotiations with the city, with Seattle possible retaining them for a future team.

Dallas and Portland voted against Bennett. Mavericks owner Mark Cuban has repeatedly said it is bad business for the NBA to relocate from a vibrant, larger market like Seattle to a smaller one. Trail Blazers owner Paul Allen, a Seattle software billionaire, likely kept his friends and made some more in the Emerald City with his vote.

http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news?slug=ap-s...p&type=lgns

Shame about Seattle, the Sonics had a pretty good run in the town which included a league championship. I reckon the move isn't the best thing for the NBA though, considering the way it has happened and the new location of the team (Oklahoma City, with all due respect, isn't as dynamic as Seattle).

I think the owner wanted the team in Oklahoma all along, surely the guy who sold the team to him should have known that?



btw, in case you haven't noticed, the Playoffs are on The Magic with their first postseason win in almost five years!

Two in a row, two more to go! All this, despite the refs' best efforts to pry the victory away from the Magic


A series win would be huge for not only the franchise, but all of Orlando, I'm certain of that.

next possible italian in NBA:



and

...

everybody in Italy thinks he's great...

The pressure and criticism is well and truly piling up on T-Mac. At least he's got enough grace to still take the piss.


At this rate though, he might never get out of the first round in his career

One more win for the Magic and we are through to the second round! We closed things up in Toronto very well, and hopefully we can close the series down for good tonight.

Come on Superman, give us another big game!

One night later -- Orlando, Florida is officially back on the basketball map


Mavs being clobbered by the Hornets at the moment.


Edit: The Suns have officially been eliminated from the playoffs, and it's apparently cost Mike D'Antoni his job. More importantly, for me anyway, two former Magic traitors players (Shaq and Grant Hill) have seen their title hopes dashed at the first step. Meanwhile, the Magic are off to the second round, where they will most likely face the Pistons.

Justice?


Come to think of it, Grant Hill has never gotten out of the first round of the playoffs either.

The Celtics, the best regular-season team in the NBA, are headed for Game 7 against the Atlanta Hawks. Dude.


And T-Mac's personal streak of first-round failures (six and counting!) continues with last night's loss vs the Utah Jazz.

I swear, at least one of the referees in the Magic-Pistons game tonight must have been a relative of Graham Poll.


Fucking jokes

Am I talking to myself here?


Very happy that the Magic won last night though, I know Chauncey Polyps got injured but we did a fantastic job of closing it out in the fourth quarter. A breakout game for Rashard Lewis!

Congrats on the Magic win, .K.

I've been finishing up my current bartending job (in a bar w/ no TVs) and training for a new job so i've missed a lot of games.

Caught the end of game 6 against the Hawks. that was one crazy fourth quarter. props to the Hawks for drawing it out to seven. yeah, we finally demolished them back in Boston, but they deserve credit for everything up until then. Look forward to seeing what they have to offer next year.

Caught game one against Cleveland but didn't watch last night's. Game one was a hell of a game.

We'll see how it goes from here. A lot can happen.

And that's curtains on the Magic's season. If this series showed anything, it's that we still have to learn how to win against the best teams in the league. We have what it takes to keep up with them, make no mistake about that. But as far as overtaking them? We are still a year away, at the very least, from really becoming contenders.

And Dwight Howard, well admittedly he did not live up to his Superman billing at all. If anything, I think he was "found out" during the series. He was able to get by (and actually thrive) on sheer athleticism alone versus the Raptors; but that was never going to happen against the Pistons. The way they played him all series made several things very clear about Dwight:

1. Aside from dunks, putbacks, and a rare hook shot, he can't shoot the ball to save his life
2. He has no effective offensive move near the basket
3. He gets agitated far too easily (i.e. complaining to the referee about the slightest contact)
4. He's not as physically imposing/intimidating as he is made out to be
5. He's still got ways to go before his skills can match his physical talent


Having said that, I'm pretty proud of what he and the Magic were able to accomplish this season. After all, this was the team that made the city Orlando relevant in the basketball circles once again. It's been a long time coming indeed.

Hopefully another year under Van Gundy should bring more prosperity

Celtics brought to seven games again and prevail again but we need to learn how to win on the road in the post-season if we're to get past the Pistons. The Cavs could have taken us at home especially in game seven. I think my heart about stopped when Pierce's freethrow at the end popped up and looked like it was going to bounce out. Great year for the Celtics, but the boys need to focus and show the determination they showed while visiting during the regular season. If they can get that kind of result away with this kind of pressure I'll feel like we just might be able to pull it off. Either way, unbelievable season.

Frustrating loss to the Pistons tonight. They owned us for a while, then it looked like we were ready to shut them down and pull ahead, but as we neared their scoreline we lost the momentum. The final minutes left us close enough to taste victory but not able to attain it. Now will be the true test. Can the Celtics win on the road in the post-season? If we can bag one of the two upcoming matches in Detroit I'll maintain my optimism.

I felt that if Celtics lost even one of the games at home, they'd be in trouble. Well, now they've dropped one...

Now they absolutely need to take a game in Detroit if they are to have any hopes. It'll be a very difficult task I reckon, not only because the Celtics haven't won a road game in the postseason, but also because The Palace is such a tough place to win for a road team, especially when the stakes are high.

I'm not too optimistic about their chances, but they did win in Detroit during the regular season.


P.S. That Rip Hamilton character is a player. I only know too well having watched him shred the Magic defense five times in the previous series.

Doesn't look good with our post-season away record so far, but one glimmer of hope is that Ray Allen looked like he may be back in form. He score 25 points in the loss to the Pistons and was hitting some good 3s. If he's over his slump and regaining confidence we may be able to take one of the next two games. I'm nervous as hell, but Ray could be the catalyst for getting us back on track. Hopefully he racks up some points and creates an outside threat. We need it.

Just like that, the Celtics get their first road win in the playoffs.


I guess they needed a must-win situation to light their fire away from Boston?

Apparently. But now the Pistons will be sure to be fired up and play a killer game tomorrow night. I predict they win tomorrow but we take games five and six. Boston will keep the fire lit and keep it from going to seven again. I hope.

iv been following the western conference final lately, my cousin is into the eastern division as for some reason he follows Boston.

me, i go for the Spurs. simply because Shawn Michaels is from San Antonio

Last night was an intense match. Pistons never gave up the lead but the Celtics hung on for much of the game. The final scoreline didn't tell the whole story.

We need our starters to play at their highest level the next two matches. If Rondo and Allen can get in the grooves we've been used to during the season, Pistons defense won't be able to shut down Garnett and Pierce as effectively as they did last night. Perkins had a solid outing but I could see he was going to foul out by the end.

Damm the Spurs were so close well done Lakers

For the record it was a foul haha

For the record, they shouldn't have had the ball before that play anyway.

And Duncan travelled on that dunk of his in the 2nd or 3rd quarter. Meh. (ok, that one was weak, I'm desperate hehehe)

Ok, I am indeed a HUGE Lakers fan since 1980-81 (over 20-25 jerseys and 10 shorts and 3 practice pants and 7 caps and other trinkets/clothing lying around the house hehehe)

So I am indeed DEADLY biased!



But seriously, I do agree, it was indeed a big time foul. Can't BS my way out of that one fo sho

Anyway, we can chat about that while LA takes care of business in the final hihihihiiiiiiiiiiiii

San Anton deserved to lose this series anyway. How many leads can a team lose?!?! Tonight, 17 points lead... Punked out AGAIN! That's 3 games where they had a massive lead and lost it. Team is getting too old sadly.

Now I wonder how LA will handle Detroit/Celtics. Should be vERY interesting.

GO L.A.!!!!

I think the celtic would be a bad matchup for the Lakers imo.

Lakers Celtics final


Lakers to win , I go to NYC NBA store and buy some good champs merchandise