Ask Sam | Sam Smith opens his mailbag | 05.18.12  ...more ?

Sam Smith opens his mailbag to respond to the latest round of emails from his readers

NBA TV celebrates 20th anniversary of the Dream Team  ...more ?

NBA TV will celebrate the 20th anniversary of USA Basketball?s iconic team,which captured the attention of fans around the globe, when the network premieres NBA TV?s ?The Dream Team? on June 13, at 8 p.m. CT.

Difficult offseason decisions await Bulls  ...more ?

There are going to be a lot of hard decisions going forward for the Bulls, even assuming Derrick Rose, who had his surgery over the weekend, does recover well and quickly. One is the payroll, which already is around the projected luxury tax line.

Rose has surgery to repair left anterior cruciate ligament  ...more ?

Chicago Bulls guard Derrick Rose underwent successful surgery earlier today on his left anterior cruciate ligament.

Ask Sam | Sam Smith opens his mailbag | 05.11.12  ...more ?

Sam Smith opens his mailbag to respond to the latest round of emails from his readers

Mission possible? Knicks may try and deal Stoudemire  ...more ?

You get the sense the New York Knicks will stick with Carmelo Anthony and Tyson Chandler. So can they trade Amar?e Stoudemire, asks Sam Smith? Given his contract and health, it won?t be easy, but it?s also not impossible.

Ask Sam | Sam Smith opens his mailbag | 05.04.12  ...more ?

Sam Smith opens his mailbag to respond to the latest round of e-mails from his readers

Jim Cornelison to sing National Anthem for remaining Bulls home playoff games  ...more ?

The Chicago Bulls announced today that for the second year in row, tenor Jim Cornelison, the Chicago Blackhawks? full-time National Anthem singer will sing the National Anthem at all Bulls home games for the remainder of their playoff run.

Scottie Pippen's open letter to the 2011-12 Chicago Bulls  ...more ?

Scottie Pippen's open letter to the 2011-12 Chicago Bulls

No reason not to be optimistic about Rose recovery  ...more ?

Derrick Rose suffered an torn ACL, but several NBA players have had the same injury and returned to top form. ?We fully expect him to come back at 100 percent,? said Bulls GM Gar Forman.

Yahoo! Sports

Iguodala leading the way in postseason for 76ers (The Associated Press)  ...more ?
PHILADELPHIA (AP) Andre Iguodala is winning games for the Sixers and winning over Philadelphia with each clutch basket.
Celtics Throw Eastern Conference into Even Greater Uncertainty: A Fan's Analysis (Yahoo! Contributor Network)  ...more ?
The Philadelphia 76ers were supposed to have no chance to win the Eastern Conference. In fact, Sixers fans like myself were all but resigned to the Sixers being stepping stones for the Boston Celtics to take one last conference title. With the Chicago Bulls out and the Miami Heat collapsing against the Indiana Pacers, the Celtics seemed ready to fill the void in the East one last time.
76ers stun Celtics 92-83 in Game 4 to even series (The Associated Press)  ...more ?
PHILADELPHIA (AP) Andre Iguodala squared up for a 3-pointer from the wing like he had hundreds of times in his career.
Philadelphia 76ers rally to beat Celtics in NBA series (AFP)  ...more ?
Andre Iguodala finished with 16 points, seven rebounds and four assists as the Philadelphia 76ers rallied to beat the Boston Celtics 92-83 in game four of their Eastern Conference series.
NBA: Oden having surgery in hopes of reviving career (The SportsXchange)  ...more ?
Former No. 1 NBA draft pick Greg Oden reportedly has undergone a controversial procedure to try to kick-start his waning basketball career.
Report: Ewing has 'good chance' to be Bobcats coach (The SportsXchange)  ...more ?
Orlando Magic assistant coach Patrick Ewing reportedly has a "good chance" of getting the Charlotte Bobcats head coaching job.
Steve Blake, wife receive death threats via Twitter after Lakers? Game 2 loss (Ball Don't Lie)  ...more ?
After scoring 19 points and hitting five 3-pointers in a huge Game 7 performance to beat the Denver Nuggets, Steve Blake was lauded for shaking off a 12-for-33 mark in the first six games and coming up big when it counted. But after missing an open corner 3-pointer that would have given the Los Angeles Lakers a one-point lead in the closing seconds of Game 2 ? a game that the Lakers led by seven with two minutes left, a game they gave away in a manner befitting Santa Claus , according to their center ? some fickle fans changed their tune on the backup point guard and, disgustingly, brought his family into the mix. From Dave McMenamin at ESPN Los Angeles : After the game, both the Twitter feeds of Blake and his wife, Kristen, were inundated with criticism ranging from curse word-laden rants to threats. "I hope your family gets murdered," read one tweet that Kristen Blake re-tweeted along with a single comment: "Wow." [...] Steve Blake responded to the troublesome situation after Lakers practice on Thursday. "It's pretty disappointing that there are a lot of hateful people out there, but you move on," Blake said. "I just don't appreciate it when it's toward my family. You can come at me all you want but when you say things about my wife and my kids, that makes me upset." As horrendous and regrettable as this is, it's nothing new; as long as there have been sporting matches to lose, there have been goats blamed for losing them, and pockets of disgruntled, perspective-lacking fandom whose pursuit of doling that blame out ventures far beyond the pale of reason and decency. (And let's be clear about this: "Lakers fans" aren't to be blamed for death threats and hate speech lobbed uncaringly at the Blakes; "awful, lunatic-fringe idiots" are. Several bad apples don't spoil a gigantic, passionate bunch.) What is relatively new, though, is how social media outlets ? primarily Twitter, since more pros actually seem to use and manage Twitter accounts themselves than handle, say, their own Facebook pages or write their own blogs ? and the immediate connections they afford fans to the objects of their obsession can factor into this mix.
Spurs rip Clippers for 16th win in a row (AFP)  ...more ?
Tony Parker celebrated his 30th birthday by scoring 22 points to lead San Antonio over the Los Angeles Clippers 105-88, stretching the Spurs' win streak to 16 games.
Andrew Bynum after 9-0 Thunder run beats Lakers: ?We?re better than Santa Claus? (Ball Don't Lie)  ...more ?
After an Andrew Bynum bucket with 2:08 remaining in the fourth quarter, the Los Angeles Lakers looked to be sitting pretty. They held a seven-point lead over the Oklahoma City Thunder thanks to nearly 46 minutes of gritty ground-and-pound that made the postseason's best offense ? yes, the Thunder entered Wednesday night averaging more points per 100 playoff possessions than even the San Antonio Spurs ? look disjointed and stale. OKC had hit just 39.7 percent of its shots en route to 68 measly points two nights after scoring 119 in Game 1 , and didn't appear to be anywhere near getting well against a Laker team that had held it to just 20 second-half points. Unfortunately for the Lakers, appearances can be deceiving. Whether you'd like to laud Kevin Durant for the win, damn Kobe Bryant for the loss, do neither or choose both, the fact remains that Oklahoma City went on a 9-0 run in the final 128 seconds to score a 77-75 Game 2 win , take a 2-0 lead in their Western Conference semifinal series and deliver a serious haymaker to L.A.'s spirits as it heads home for Friday night's Game 3. The Lakers blew this one, and their center knows it. Bynum (20 points on 8-of-19 shooting and nine rebounds in the loss) said as much with a sharp, somewhat curious postgame turn of phrase that was shared by the Lakers' Twitter account and later expounded upon by Sekou Smith at NBA.com's Hang Time blog : The Lakers led 75-68 with two minutes to play with the game seemingly in hand. But instead of the veteran Lakers salting this one away with Kobe Bryant finishing the deal, the Lakers lost control of the game and basically gave it away. "We're better than Santa Claus giving out gifts," said Lakers center Andrew Bynum. "We like giving out gifts. We give out games, contracts and rings." "We give out games, contracts and rings." What's that about?
Kobe Bryant's late mistakes doom Lakers in their Game 2 loss to Thunder (Yahoo! Sports)  ...more ?
Kobe Bryant helped give away what appeared to be a near-certain victory for the Lakers.
Kevin Durant rallies Thunder by Lakers with defense and a clutch shot (Yahoo! Sports)  ...more ?
Kevin Durant is a three-time scoring champion, but his defense on Kobe Bryant helped key the Thunder's Game 2 win.
Behind the Box Score, where the Lakers absolutely melted down the stretch (Ball Don't Lie)  ...more ?
Oklahoma City Thunder 77, Los Angeles Lakers 75 (Thunder lead series, 2-0) The Oklahoma City Thunder were down seven points in this contest with two minutes left to play, with just 68 points to their credit. And though we've seen comebacks that overcome that differential in even shorter amounts of time, given Los Angeles' defensive dominance for the first 46 minutes of the contest, who in their right mind thought the Thunder could outscore the Lakers by eight points over that final term, considering that they had to essentially pitch a shutout because of the waning seconds? Well, the Thunder managed one of the two. They pitched the shutout, but they didn't outscore Los Angeles by eight in the final two minutes. They outscored 'em by nine. The Thunder are championship-worthy, and the Lakers have their problems, but it's OK to be shocked at the way Los Angeles frittered away this contest.
Celtics top 76ers 107-91 in Game 3 for 2-1 lead (The Associated Press)  ...more ?
PHILADELPHIA (AP) Kevin Garnett yapped his way down the court after big baskets and clearly enjoyed taking it to the 76ers.
Evan Turner loves getting his butt kicked (Ball Don't Lie)  ...more ?
Much has been made of the way the Philadelphia 76ers stood toe-to-toe with the Boston Celtics in the first two games of their Eastern Conference semifinal series, storming out to a sizable lead in Game 1 before faltering late and dropping a one-point affair, then withstanding an early Celtics barrage on Monday night before locking down late to secure a Game 2 win . One of the key elements in Philly's strong close to the second game was Evan Turner. While the sophomore needed 11 shots to score 10 points on Monday and turned the ball over five times, he made several big plays at critical moments to help Doug Collins' team snare a split at the TD Garden and home-court advantage heading back to the Wells Fargo Center for Game 3 on Wednesday night. It was a hard game to win ? and in some respects, as Turner told Jessica Camerato of CSNNE.com , it's the kind of game the Celtics have taught the former No. 2 overall pick, who struggled mightily in the early going as a rook and in his first two career games against Boston, how to win. When Turner played against the Boston Celtics last season as a 22-year-old rookie on the Philadelphia 76ers, he was already familiar with his opponents from what he had seen of them on TV. Then the veterans introduced him to their game in the NBA. They tested the young guard during his first year in the NBA, a challenge he appreciates now. "Watching them on TV and playing against them is two different things," Turner told CSNNE.com. "First few times we played against them, they kicked our butts. One of the best things is getting your butts kicked and paying your dues. I can't say it enough ? paying your dues and earning the right to play well and earning the right to play well versus them, that's the most important thing." [Marc J. Spears: Kobe Bryant won't blame fatigue on Lakers' blowout loss to Thunder ] This may seem like a far-too-positive stance on getting one's butt kicked, but it's precisely the kind of response that coaches and team executives want to see from a young player ? acceptance of the struggles you've faced, willingness to learn from them and purposeful action toward changing the outcome next time.
The Spurs? 15-game winning streak: A look inside the numbers (Ball Don't Lie)  ...more ?
One night after the Oklahoma City Thunder convinced a lot of people that they were the team to beat in the Western Conference by walloping the Los Angeles Lakers , the San Antonio Spurs offered their retort: A measured, professional destruction of the Los Angeles Clippers. In the 108-92 Game 1 win, the Spurs made perhaps the best point guard in the world look ordinary. They choked off Chris Paul's patented pick-and-roll game, eliminating his outlet options and forcing him to take contested shots, harassing him into a 3-for-13 showing, five turnovers and his lowest point total since Feb. 4 . Without its primary weapon, Vinny Del Negro's team became a half-dimensional one-on-one team, and the results ? 92 points, a 7-of-17 shooting performance by Blake Griffin, barely any offensive spark to speak of (save for the excellent bench play of Eric Bledsoe) ? spoke for themselves. On the other end, San Antonio calmly got just about whatever it wanted, wherever it wanted. Of the Spurs' 80 field-goal attempts in Game 1, 65 came either in the paint or from 3-point range, according to NBA.com's shot location statistics , and they made 32 of them (52.3 percent), including a shattering 13-of-25 mark from beyond the arc. That pushes their postseason success rate on long balls to 43.4 percent; the next most accurate team from distance, the Thunder, has hit 38.6 percent . To do all that on a night where point guard Tony Parker ? who carved up the Utah Jazz in the opening round (21 points on 50 percent shooting and 6.5 assists in 32.8 minutes per game in the sweep) ? missed 8 of 9 shots, scored just seven points and turned it over nine times in 38 minutes? That's pretty impressive. Also impressive: The win was San Antonio's 15th straight. (As BDL editor emeritus/TBJ co-host J.E. Skeets noted Tuesday night , it's also the Spurs' 28th in their last 30 games and 43rd in their last 50.) They haven't lost since a 14-point defeat at the hands of the Lakers on April 11 ? that was 35 days ago . But it's not only that they've been winning; it's the way they've been winning. Just how good has Gregg Popovich's team been during its rampaging run? Let's take a look inside the numbers.