NBA Thread

[J-Reb]

Lowry getting in shouldn't be a surprise. There should be some Atlanta Hawks on the Eastern team for sure.

But who?  There isn't one player worthy of being on the team.

[GM Franchise]

But who?  There isn't one player worthy of being on the team.

Jeff Teague, Al Horford, Paul Millsap, and Kyle Korver are all viable options.

[J-Reb]

Jeff Teague, Al Horford, Paul Millsap, and Kyle Korver are all viable options.

Teague would be the 5th or 6th guard in the East, IMO.  Horford is a possibility.  But Millsap and Korver shouldn't even sniff an all-star game.

[J-Reb]

Teague would be the 5th or 6th guard in the East, IMO.  Horford is a possibility.  But Millsap and Korver shouldn't even sniff an all-star game.

Just quickly glancing through the list of guards - I'd pick Dwayne Wade, Kyrie Irving, Jimmy Butler, Kemba Walker, Brandon Knight, and Derrick Rose.  So, 7th for me.

[GM Franchise]

Teague would be the 5th or 6th guard in the East, IMO.  Horford is a possibility.  But Millsap and Korver shouldn't even sniff an all-star game.

Korver is on pace to have the greatest shooting season in NBA history. He should be considered for that.

[Gates]

Lowry getting in shouldn't be a surprise.

Being a Toronto sports fan, I don't assume anything until it's official.

[GM Franchise]

Klay Thompson scored 37 points in a quarter tonight...37!

Watch every shot of Klay Thompson's record-breaking 37-point quarter

http://www.sbnation.com/lookit/2015/1/24/7880983/watch-every-shot-of-klay-thompsons-record-breaking-37-point-quarter

Klay Thompson had a nice little first half. Then the third quarter started and Klay ignited, flames engulfing his person from head to toe. Here's all of it:

He started the period with 13 points and ended it with FIFTY points. This may honestly be the densest hot streak in the history of professional basketball. It was like watching an atom break on the hardwood.

The stats and records and outpourings of awe:

- 37 is the record for points in a single quarter, destroying the record of 33 held by George Gervin and Carmelo Anthony.

- NINE three-pointers is the record for threes in a quarter, breaking the mark of 8 set by Michael Redd and Joe Johnson.

- Klay went 13-for-13 in the quarter, tying the record for field goals in a quarter set by David Thompson.

- Here is the most beautiful single-quarter shot chart you'll ever see:

klay

Not an X to be found.


- In the final seconds of the third, Thompson decided to pass and I punched myself in the forehead because I was so angry at him for doing so. On the very last possession of the quarter, someone fouled him, and he went ahead and buried a jumper that coooould have counted for continuation. Instead, he just hit both free throws.

- After hitting free throws for points 51 and 52 in the fourth quarter, Klay missed a shot and I vomited.

- The Kings had 22 points in the period to Thompson's 37. The Kings are a whole basketball team.

- And yeah, he ended that game by himself:


- All Stephen Curry could do is laugh:


- Imagine being that human being's father. Man, Mychal Thompson must be having the night of his life:


- You don't have to be his dad to lose your damn mind over this. NBA players around the league did so much screaming:




And in closing, here's Klay checking out his stat sheet:

wtf

"Oh, sweet, I blacked out for 10 minutes and wrote the Bible."

[GM Franchise]

MOST POINTS IN A QUARTER

37- Klay Thompson

33- George Gervin

33- Carmelo Anthony

32- David Thompson

31- Wilt Chamberlain

[Jon]

Clay Thompson is a beast!

[GM Franchise]

PISTONS' JENNINGS SUFFERS LEG INJURY

http://hangtime.blogs.nba.com/2015/01/24/pistons-jennings-suffers-leg-injury/?ls=iref:nbahpts

Brandon Jennings, a driving force as the Pistons recovered from a terrible start to win 12 of 15 games and get in the Eastern Conference playoff picture, suffered an undisclosed leg injury Saturday night in Milwaukee.
"It doesn't look good," coach Stan Van Gundy said after the Bucks' 101-86 victory.

There was no further word on the specific injury or the potential severity. More will be known after follow-up examinations, but Vincent Goodwill Jr. wrote in the Detroit News that "Bucks point guard Brandon Knight pushed off Jennings to receive an inbounds pass in the third quarter Saturday night, then Jennings' left leg appeared to give out on him — as he writhed in pain on the baseline, yelling out and spinning on the floor multiple times before team medical personnel were able to get to him.

"Jennings could put no weight on his leg as he was helped off the floor, possibly ending his recent resurgence — and facing the possibility of a long recovery from what could be a torn Achilles."

Jennings later posted on Twitter: "We gotta just keep pushin' WE (Pistons) worked to hard to get down about anything right now. We gotta stay focus on the main Goal. Playoffs!"

He did not mention the injury.

Adrian Wojnarowski        ✔ @WojYahooNBA
Follow
Strong belief within the Pistons that guard Brandon Jennings tore his Achilles tonight, but won't know for sure until MRI on Sunday.

[GM Franchise]

Steph Curry to enter 3-point contest

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/12234685/stephen-curry-golden-state-warriors-highlights-3-point-all-star-contestants

The Golden State Warriors' backcourt duo of Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson highlight a group of five players who plan to participate in next month's All-Star 3-point contest, Yahoo! Sports has reported.

The Los Angeles Clippers' J.J. Redick confirmed that he will compete, and the report, citing league sources, said Atlanta's Kyle Korver and Portland's Wesley Matthews will join in.

"It's something that I've always wanted to participate in at least once in my career," Redick said Monday night. "I don't know if I've been in the conversation but I'm just excited and honored to be a part of All-Star Weekend."

The group makes up five of the top seven shooters in the NBA in 3-pointers made, with Matthews' 138 leading the league.

"It's a good field," Redick said. "You have to post a high score this year. I've watched a couple years at home and, um, it's not the best field ... just saying. Not the best field. You have non-shooters winning, but I think the NBA put together a great field this year. Hopefully everybody shoots well and it's a good show."

James Harden of the Houston Rockets (122) and Damian Lillard of the Portland Trail Blazers (120) are fifth and sixth. Harden leads the NBA in scoring average at 27.6 points per game.

Korver, shooting 53 percent, tops the NBA in 3-point accuracy with Thompson in third at 46 percent.

Curry made a late surge to pass LeBron James as the overall leading vote-getter for the All-Star Game and will start for the West.

The Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York, is hosting this year's NBA All-Star Weekend, set for Feb. 13-15.

---


NBA reveals dunk contest lineup

http://espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/12239406/2015-slam-dunk-contest-lineup-giannis-antetokounmpo-zach-lavine-victor-oladipo-mason-plumlee

Milwaukee's Giannis Antetokounmpo, Minnesota's Zach LaVine, Orlando's Victor Oladipo and Brooklyn's Mason Plumlee will be the contestants in the 2015 Sprite Slam Dunk contest, the NBA announced Tuesday night.

Plumlee tweeted he was "thrilled" to be taking part in the contest:


LaVine also relayed a message via Twitter:


The dunk contest will be Feb. 14 at Barclays Center, part of NBA All-Star Weekend in New York. The All-Star Game will be Feb. 15 at Madison Square Garden.

This year's dunk contest will feature two rounds and no time limits. Each player will get two dunks in the first round, with the two players with the highest combined scores advancing to the final round. The two finalists also will get two dunks apiece in the head-to-head round.

There is a three-attempt maximum for each dunk. The event will feature five judges, who will score each dunk on a scale of 6 to 10, for a low score of 30 and a high score of 50.

The 2014 dunk contest champion was the Washington Wizards' John Wall.

[GM Franchise]

Kobe Bryant expected out 9 months

http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/nba/story/_/id/12244429/kobe-bryant-los-angeles-lakers-surgery-9-months

EL SEGUNDO, Calif. -- Kobe Bryant is officially done for the season after having surgery to repair his torn right rotator cuff Wednesday.

The Los Angeles Lakers also made it official that their superstar doesn't believe his career is finished.

Bryant is expected to need nine months to recover from his third straight season-ending injury. If Bryant meets that timetable, he could return to basketball shortly before the start of the 2015-16 season -- and the Lakers expect to see him in purple and gold again.

"
I think the biggest thing with Kobe, as long as [the media are] saying that he's done, he's going to come back. I think he proved his point this year that he still has a lot left in the tank. He's still one of the best players in the league.
"
- Lakers coach Byron Scott
Neal ElAttrache and Steve Lombardo performed the two-hour surgery at the Kerlan Jobe Orthopaedic Clinic in Los Angeles.

"I expect Kobe to make a full recovery, and if all goes as expected, he should be ready for the start of the season," ElAttrache said in a statement provided by the Lakers.

The Lakers formally declared Bryant out for the season by acknowledging the expected recovery time for his injury but also effectively confirmed he won't retire and will attempt to play his 20th season in the fall. Bryant, who will be 37 years old this summer, is the NBA's highest-paid player at $23.5 million this season, and he is under contract for $25 million next year.

"In my mind right now, he's coming back next year, unless he tells me something different," coach Byron Scott said at practice Wednesday.

Of Bryant's impending rehabilitation, Scott added, "It's pretty painful from what I've heard, and the rehab is long."

"But I think the biggest thing with Kobe, as long as [the media are] saying that he's done, he's going to come back," Scott said. "I think he proved his point this year that he still has a lot left in the tank. He's still one of the best players in the league."

Scott already had acknowledged Bryant was highly unlikely to play again this season for the flailing Lakers (12-34), who will match their franchise record for futility if they lose their 10th consecutive game when the Chicago Bulls visit Thursday. But if Los Angeles finishes with a top-five draft pick, the club won't have to give its first-round choice to Phoenix until next year to complete its trade for Steve Nash in 2012.

Bryant hurt his right shoulder while dunking last week in New Orleans, deciding Monday on surgery. He is the third-leading scorer in league history and a five-time NBA champion.

"I feel like I just returned a 100 yard kickoff in the last two minutes of the Super Bowl to win it all only to have my run called back by a flag on the play," Bryant said Tuesday night in a post on The Players' Tribune.

Bryant averaged 22.3 points, 5.7 rebounds and 5.6 assists in 35 games but made a career-worst 37.3 percent of his shots in a wildly inconsistent 19th season. He also passed Michael Jordan for third place on the NBA's career scoring list, trailing only Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Karl Malone.

Bryant's popularity hasn't waned during his injury-plagued stretch. He was voted to the All-Star Game for the 17th time this month, and he is still the Lakers' public face despite his recent prolonged absences from the court.

Bryant missed the 2013 playoffs after tearing his Achilles tendon late in the regular season, and he played in just six games last season before breaking a bone near his left knee. Although he has played through innumerable injuries in the past, the accumulated wear from nearly two decades in the NBA has caught up to him.

Bryant sat out eight games to rest in the past month, and he played under a strict minutes limit. It wasn't enough to protect him from another major injury.

Bryant joins Nash, first-round pick Julius Randle and swingman Xavier Henry with season-ending injuries already for the Lakers.

[GM Franchise]

Klay Thompson a first-time All-Star

http://espn.go.com/nba/allstar2015/story/_/id/12250218/2015-nba-all-star-reserves

Golden State's Klay Thompson, Chicago's Jimmy Butler and Atlanta's Jeff Teague ‎are first-time NBA All-Stars after being selected by coaches in their respective conferences.

The league announced Thursday night that Teague is one of three members of the 38-8 Atlanta Hawks to make the Eastern Conference squad alongside teammates Al Horford and Paul Millsap.

But Sacramento Kings big man DeMarcus Cousins -- one of just three players in the league averaging better than 20 points and 10 rebounds per game alongside West starter Anthony Davis and reserve LaMarcus Aldridge -- and Portland Trail Blazers guard Damian Lillard were the most prominent players snubbed by the coaches in the packed West.

Aldridge, San Antonio's Tim Duncan and Oklahoma City star Kevin Durant earned frontcourt spots ahead of Cousins, with Durant, as the league's reigning MVP, getting the nod from West coaches ‎despite playing in only 21 of the Thunder's first 46 games this season because of injuries.

Houston's James Harden, Oklahoma City's Russell Westbrook and the Los Angeles Clippers' Chris Paul also are West reserves.

The season-ending shoulder injury suffered by the Los Angeles Lakers' Kobe Bryant means NBA commissioner Adam Silver will be charged with choosing Bryant's replacement. Western Conference coach Steve Kerr will have the right to choose who starts in Bryant's place, with Harden and Thompson believed to be in pole position to step in.

Joining Horford, Millsap, Teague and Butler as Eastern Conference reserves are Cleveland's Kyrie Irving and the Miami duo of Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade.

Yet, with the Heat announcing Thursday that Wade is "out indefinitely" because of a hamstring problem, it's likely that Silver will also have to select a replacement for him in the East.

As it stands, Cousins and Lillard are joined on the list of prominent snubs in the West by the Memphis duo of Zach Randolph and Mike Conley, Dallas' Dirk Nowitzki, Monta Ellis and Tyson Chandler, Houston's Dwight Howard, San Antonio's Kawhi Leonard and the Clippers' DeAndre Jordan.

Prominent snubs in the East include Atlanta's Kyle Korver, Orlando's Nikola Vucevic, Cleveland's Kevin Love, Charlotte's Kemba Walker and Al Jefferson, Detroit's Greg Monroe and Brandon Jennings, and Milwaukee's Brandon Knight.

Head coaches in each conference had to vote for two guards, three frontcourt players and two players regardless of position. They couldn't vote for players on their own teams.

The All-Star Game starters were announced last week after fan voting.

[GM Franchise]

Adam Silver says NBA will consider taking top 16 teams for the playoffs

http://www.sbnation.com/nba/2015/2/5/7989691/adam-silver-nba-playoffs-rule-changes-conference-imbalance

As the three-team race for the final seed in the Western Conference playoffs heats up, there's bound to be more attention on the imbalance that exists between the NBA's two conferences. The West has been noticeably stronger for 14 years, but the NBA has remained steadfast in sticking with the current system that sends the top eight teams in each conference to the postseason.

Perhaps that will change sometime soon. In an interview with Warriors broadcasters during Golden State's game with the Dallas Mavericks on Wednesday night, Commissioner Adam Silver was asked if the league would look into changing which teams make the playoffs. Here's his response:

"Ultimately we want to see your best teams in the playoffs," Silver said. "And there is an unbalance and a certain unfairness. There is a proposal where the division winners would all automatically go into the playoffs and then you'd seed the next 10 best teams. I think that's the kind of proposal we need to look at. There are travel issues of course, but in this day in age every team of course has their own plane, travels charter. I don't think the discussion should end there. And as I've said, my first year I was studying a lot of these issues and year two is time to take action. It's something I'm going to look at closely with the competition committee. I do think it's an area where we need to make a change."

Silver has publicly discussed several changes during his short time as commissioner, from raising the age limit to enter the draft to a potential midseason tournament.

At the moment, the Suns, Thunder and Pelicans are each above .500 and chasing one playoff spot in the West. Over in the East, the Charlotte Hornets are the No. 7 seed at 21-27 and the Miami Heat are the eighth seed at 21-28. Our own Tom Ziller has offered a proposal to fix conference imbalance.

[GM Franchise]

STAR-STUDDED THREE-POINT SHOOTOUT FIELD HIGHLIGHTS ALL-STAR SATURDAY NIGHT

http://hangtime.blogs.nba.com/2015/02/05/star-studded-three-point-shootout-field-highlights-all-star-saturday-night/

[HANG TIME BIG CITY — Forget East versus West. After two years of NBA All-Star Saturday Night pitting one conference against the other, this time, it's personal. And for once, long range marksmanship may trump dunks as the center of attraction.

Conference affiliations will be out the window on Saturday, Feb. 14, for the State Farm All-Star Saturday Night at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, N.Y. This year, it's every man and woman for themselves in the annual Saturday night showcase.

In the Degree Shooting Stars competition, the two-time defending championship team of Chris Bosh, Dominique Wilkins and Swin Cash will reunite. Although this is a shooting competition, Team Davis, made up of Anthony Davis, Scottie Pippen and Elena Delle Donne, will have unbelievable length. Other participants include Golden State's Stephen Curry and his father, retired guard Dell.

Eight players will compete in the Taco Bell Skills Challenge, a three-round, obstacle-course competition that tests dribbling, passing, agility and shooting skills. Seven of those players are point guards, including the defending champ, Utah's Trey Burke, as well as All-Stars Kyle Lowry, Jeff Teague and John Wall. The lone non-point guard in the field is Chicago's Jimmy Butler, an All-Star swingman with well-rounded skills.

The Sprite Slam Dunk field was announced a few weeks ago. Giannis Antetokounmpo, Zach LaVine, Victor Oladipo and
Mason Plumlee bring an energetic edge to the proceedings this season. Brooklyn's Plumlee is the lone active NBA player with New York ties participating on Saturday night.

Yet even with the loaded dunk field, it may be tough to top the Foot Locker Three-Point Contest, which is this year stocked with sharpshooters ...

Marco Belinelli, Spurs — Last year's defending champ, Belinelli has played just 30 games this season due to injury. Belinelli has the lowest 3-point percentage (38.2) of any player in the Three-Point Contest field.

Stephen Curry, Warriors — Drained 10 3-pointers Wednesday night in a 51-point performance against the Mavs. Earlier this season, became fastest player in NBA history to make 1,000 career 3s.

Klay Thompson, Warriors — At 44.6 percent, Thompson trails only Korver in 3-point percentage this season. Thompson and Curry are the only teammates ever to combine for 400 3-pointers in back-to-back seasons.
James Harden, Rockets — Fifth this season in 3-pointers made and attempts, and the NBA's leading scorer at 27 points.

Kyrie Irving, Cavaliers — Other than Belinelli, Irving has the least made treys in the field, with 100. But last year's All-Star Game MVP has a flair for the dramatic, and he knocked down 11 3s in his 55-point performance a few weeks back against Portland.

Kyle Korver, Hawks — On pace to have the greatest 3-point shooting season in NBA history, currently leading the NBA in 3-point accuracy at 53.2 percent. Korver is attempting to become the first player in history among qualifiers to shoot at least 50 percent from the field, 50 percent from beyond the arc and 90 percent from the free-throw line.

Wesley Matthews, Trail Blazers — Leads the NBA in 3-pointers made (151) and attempted (375). Has had 11 games this season where he made at least 5 3-pointers.

J.J. Redick, Clippers — Has made 114 3-pointers, putting him on track to break his previous high of 165. Currently shooting a career-high 43.2 percent on 3s.

State Farm NBA All-Star Saturday Night will be televised live exclusively on TNT on Saturday, Feb. 14, from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York./quote]