John Stockton is going into the basketball Hall of Fame on Friday and these are just some of my recollections of his career.

For your intrepid author it was a rare treat to see John Stockton play basketball with Karl Malone. It was always Stockton and Malone, Stockton and Malone, those two were inseparable and they made the Utah Jazz. The Jazz at times seemed like an afterthought in the Western Conference of the NBA and there was always a team that was just slightly better to nose ahead of them. This still did not stop me from watching the Jazz whenever they were on TV, which was not very often from my perch in Michigan.

Stockton would always find Malone on a fast break or pick and roll play multiple times a game and it showed in the final stats for the National Basketball Association assists leaders. Every year it was a given that Stockton would be at or near the top of that list and when all was said and done he was the out right leader with 15,806 assists. In case you were wondering, John Stockton also scored 19,711, so he was not just a one option wonder.

Stockton owns five of the top six assist seasons in NBA history, holds the record for most seasons and most consecutive games played for one team and he’s third behind only Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and Robert Parish in total games played.

In 19 grueling NBA regular-season marathons, he missed only 22 of 1,526 games, 18 of those in a single year when doctors told him he needed knee surgery, but Stockton chose merely to sit out a few weeks and returned to finish out the schedule.

“He worked harder than you,” said Utah Jazz coach Jerry Sloan. “That was his secret.

“He’s one of the most unique players you’ll ever run across. You can talk about all the things he tried to do. But first of all, you’ve got to look at his stature. He’s not a very big guy. And yet he played as strong and tough as anybody could.”
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John Stockton and Karl Malone

The vision of Stockton and Malone working together on the floor is a special kind of athletic poetry. There may have been more rewards for them if they had only had one or two more talented players to allow them to compete with the Lakers and other great teams, but my reward was to watch John Stockton play.

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For all you old fogeys out there, twitter is where it is at and where you are at or should be. Hold on; have to update my twitter, “typing my blog”. You see, somewhere, someone wanted to know that. It is the days of instant communication and twitter is the latest fad.

Allen Iverson will Twitter in Memphis

Allen Iverson has been shopping his services after the disaster in Detroit and was about to give up when lo and behold the Memphis Grizzlies, a sort of NBA team, have agreed to sign him.

Iverson’s decision came following a Monday night meeting in Atlanta with Griz owner Michael Heisley, general manager Chris Wallace and head coach Lionel Hollins. Iverson, a 34-year-old, 13-year veteran, will play for a contract that pays $3.5 million (what the Griz have left under the salary cap) and the deal will be loaded with incentives.
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To say the Memphis writers and fans are not concerned about this deal is like saying my Mom is not concerned about being old. This deal will destroy an already not promising team. Oh, there is young talent there; waiting for Iverson to do not mold them into a unit, but there is not any kind of a plan.

If you want to build a basketball team, you go get David Lee and Ramon Sessions during the offseason. If you want to build a freak show, you go get A.I. and Z-Bo.

At the start of last season, Heisley had a three-year plan. At the start of this season, his plan has become “Oh, what the Hell.”

Zach Randolph is available?

Oh, what the Hell.

Allen Iverson is available?

Oh, what the Hell.

What are the Memphis fans going to do, anyway? Not go to games?

Now the team will be interesting, at the very least. In the same way that a demolition derby is interesting, that Jon and Kate are interesting, that Mike Tyson was interesting.

This cannot end well.
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None the less, Allen Iverson remains one of the most entertaining and fan popular players in the game. Everyone wants to root for the little guy, except maybe the team that owns him.

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In our earlier post the discussion was about who would win the West and it was the obvious choice, the Lakers and Kobe Bryant. Now it is time to speak about the East.

So, who did ESPN vote to win the East?

In a surprise vote, but maybe not a huge surprise, the ESPN voters went with Cleveland. They felt the Shaqland LeBrons would win the East, because they looked so good last year and then they added Shaq. It will not be that easy. There are already a lot of ingredients to mix into this soup.

Looming over it all will be the question LeBron James won’t answer: What will he do when he can become a free agent in 2010? His freedom to walk next year has raised the stakes in Cleveland to a level seldom seen in the NBA, and could contribute to tensions along the way unless LeBron, Shaq and the Cavs can successfully merge their games and their goals: LeBron’s first title, Shaq’s fifth (putting him ahead of Kobe Bryant and Tim Duncan) and Cleveland’s hope of pleasing and keeping LeBron. And with the Cavs having added three rotation players to a 66-win team and probably demoting stalwart Zydrunas Ilgauskas in favor of The Big Disruption, it’s not clear how chemically balanced they will be.

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How they could pass on the Boston Celtics is a true mystery. The Celtics bring back a healthy Kevin Garnett and added Rasheed Wallace and Marquis Daniels to the fold. They are dripping with talent.

Will Rasheed Wallace help Boston overtake LeBron James and the Cav's?

Lagging in third place is the Conference Champion Orland Magic. Some think they overachieved last year and worry that the chemistry will be different without Hedo Turkoglu. Others think the offensive talents of Vince Carter will make Dwight Howard even more valuable.
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ESPN does this thing where they get together a bunch of basketball experts that vote on the NBA conference teams to see who will end up in the NBA title game.

Well, this was a tough vote. The Los Angeles Lakers won in a landslide. Geez that is hardly news. The champs added Ron Artest to the lineup and resigned Lamar Odom and those two are just bit players on that team. You have to recognize that the Lakers are Kobe Bryant’s team first last and always. Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum give them plenty of size and firepower to go around. On a pure team basis, maybe only the Boston Celtics come close in overall talent.

On paper, the multifaceted Artest is an upgrade, of course, even over a talented player like Trevor Ariza, whom Artest is replacing as the Lakers’ small forward and defensive stopper. But Ron-Ron has a well-earned, well-known rep as a disruptive, often maniacal force: Just four months ago, he was ejected twice in the playoffs versus the Lakers.

The offseason has been no quieter. Stories emerged about Artest visiting the Lakers’ shower in Boston unannounced to address Kobe while Artest was a member of the Sacramento Kings, and taking a team bus in his underwear while with the Houston Rockets, both incidents happening in the past 15 months. Then there was his head-spinning torrent of tweets and a bizarre rap tribute to Michael Jackson, for whose album “Thriller” Artest selected his latest uniform number and latest Twitter name, ThugRaider37, replacing his former moniker, 96TruwarierQB (Google it), which itself was a small reminder of what took place at his previous stop, Indiana, which was very eager to move him to his next destination on his one-of-a-kind NBA journey.

Could this be the beginning of a beautiful friendship between the Lakers and Ron-Ron? Could Artest play the tough-guy role that Dennis Rodman perfected for three Bulls championship teams under Phil Jackson? Sure.

But all in all, it’s quite a roll of the dice by a team that was sure to be favored to win it all anyway.

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Will Ron Artest upset the Kobe Bryant apple cart?

Not to be counted out the San Antonio Spurs received the second most votes and any team with Tim Duncan can never be counted out. The Spurs picked up Richard Jefferson, but the rumored pickup of Rasheed Wallace never happened. Perhaps if the Wallace deal had taken place the Spurs would have received many more votes.

For now, unless Ron Artest explodes the Lakers, it appears the Lakers are the team to beat in the West.

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If there is a deeper team in all of basketball, then they automatically deserve the NBA title, because the Boston Celtics are super deep.

Now the Celtics have signed Marquise Daniels, the former Indiana Pacer.

Daniels is coming off the best of his six seasons, averaging career highs of 13.6 points and 4.6 rebounds in 54 games with the Indiana Pacers, 43 of them starts.

The 28-year-old Daniels spent three seasons with Dallas before moving to Indiana. For his career, he is averaging 9.4 points in 351 games, including 109 starts.
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Marquise is 6′6″ tall and can play the big guard position. Yeah, Boston was lacking at the big guard backup position. Like they actually lack at any position.

Check out this lineup:
You have Rajon Rondo and Ray Allen at the guard positions.
You have Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett at the forward positions.
You have Kendrick Perkins playing center.

Kevin Garnett is looking forward to playing with Marquis Daniels

That alone would be enough, but check out these backups:
You have Eddie House, the 3 point shooter, and Tony Allen, and now Marquise Daniels at the backup guard position.
You have Brian Scalabrine and Glen Davis at backup forward.
Then you can top it off with Rasheed Wallace at center.

Maybe the toughest thing all year will be to decide who plays in the 4th quarter with the game on the line. So how good is Boston? Well, the Boston Globe reports that Marquise Daniels turned down more money from other teams to play for the Celtics with the belief that they can win the NBA Title.
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Bill Laimbeer came out of the California high school system as a center and played at Notre Dame. He was drafted by the Cleveland Cavaliers. After playing in Italy for a season, Bill returned to Cleveland and played two years before being traded to the Isiah Thomas led Detroit Pistons.

While playing for the Pistons, Laimbeer teamed up with Rick Mahorn to win a NBA title and develop a reputation for meanness on the court. One of his favorite moves on post defense was to swipe his hand down to rake your arm as you tried to turn to shoot. He did it in a way that was mostly hidden from the referees. It drove players crazy.

Bill Laimbeer NBA factoid: Bill Laimbeer and his Detroit teammates are the only players to have a playoff winning record against NBA legends Larry Bird, Magic Johnson, and Michael Jordan. source

Still Bill was more than that or he would not have lasted or played on the Pistons as they won a second title without Rick Mahorn. The Pistons became known as the Bad Boys because of their aggressive defense that was played in a very physical style. After the two titles the NBA changed several of their rules to tone down the defense.

There is Bill Laimbeer, but can he guard Barack Obama?

Bill was amazingly competitive and a top notch darts player. One year he announced he would win the rebounding title and then went out and did it. He was a 4 time All Star.

After the NBA there were no takers for Bill’s coaching services. It was often stated they only remembered him by reputation and did not want him around. Bill began coaching in the WNBA for the Detroit Shock and won 3 titles in 6 years. Again no NBA coaching offers came to him. Finally he quit the Shock with the stated intention to become an NBA coach.

Now along comes Kurt Rambis from the Los Angeles Lakers and hires Bill Laimbeer to be his assistant on the Minnesota Timberwolves.

New Timberwolves coach Kurt Rambis will add former Detroit Pistons bad-boy center Bill Laimbeer and former Sacramento Kings coach Reggie Theus to his staff, according to a league source.
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Need we even go through the list of Top 10 busts in the lottery for the National Basketball Association? All of you know where it leads, because all roads lead to Darko. That is truly a shame. Darko seemed to have it all. He was young, not even 18 when everyone was talking about him. He was tall, over 7 foot. He was athletic and could easily dunk the ball. Darko Milicic even appeared to have moves.

He’s the total package. His name eases right into the lame jokes (”you could get yourself another Dar-ko Milicic; you know what I mean? This guy knows what I’m talking about!”), he’s been an underachieving flameout, he only rose to prominence by taking advantage of well-sourced but not entirely basketball-savvy (at least, then) hoops scribes who were smitten by his ability to spin and dunk in an empty gym.
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Joe Dumars could not pass him up. Who could? Those that talk about taking Carmelo Anthony forget that Anthony came out of a college system where they played strictly zone defense and to this day he shoots too much and can’t guard my grandmother. Those that say Joe should have picked Chris Bosh forget that he was not that heralded coming out of college and those that say Joe should have picked Dwyane Wade forget that Wade came from Marquette and was a tweener height. You knew he could not be a true point guard and seemed a tad small for a shooting guard. Who knew?

Topping the Top 10 Lottery Busts - Darko Milicic

There is no question now that Wade, Bosh, and Anthony are all great players, but Darko is nothing but a bust. Just take a look in the mirror before you blame Joe Dumars.
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Wow, this is news. Coach meets players before season starts. Who would have thought about doing that?

Supposedly Flip Saunders has been travelling all over … all over, uh, America to meet his new players, uh, well, his old players or rather the current players for the Washington Wizards, where Flip will be coaching.

The big key was getting to know Gilbert Arenas, because now that he knows him, Gilbert will straighten up and give a full effort all the time. cough cough cough. Good luck on that one, Flip. This Washington Wizard team is driven by two players that like themselves more than they like to play defense and you should like yourself if you want to be loved, but maybe hate yourself if you want to play great defense, because it is hard!

But we digress. Agent Zero is not going to suddenly change into a complete player from an offensive talented entertaining player just because Gilbert and Flip Saunders met for a friendly chat. No, Washington is going to have all the same problems they have always had with that crew. Some nights they explode with offense and just beat you and other nights they take too many plays off and lose.

Gilbert Arenas realizes his wax image plays better defense

It seems Flip never introduced himself in Detroit and that is why he is gone.

Saunders didn’t forge a similar relationship with the Pistons. Despite helping guide Detroit to three consecutive Eastern Conference finals, Saunders never won much locker-room support. He quickly lost favor with Ben Wallace and Rasheed Wallace because the pair thought Saunders was emphasizing offense at the expense of defense – the foundation of the Pistons’ success when they won the 2004 championship under previous coach Larry Brown.

Saunders also wasn’t as strong a disciplinarian as Brown. When he tried to get tougher in his third season, it was too late. Early in the 2007-08 season, Rip Hamilton lashed out at Saunders from the bench without any rebuke from the coach. TNT analyst Chris Webber, who played for Detroit during the 2006-07 season, said during the 2008 playoffs that the Pistons didn’t listen to Saunders. Saunders was then fired after Detroit lost to Boston in the East finals.

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Yeah, 3 conference finals was a lousy job by Flip Saunders. What was he thinking? Eventually the Flip way was not the Detroit way and the players just tuned him out. Such is big time sports and big time egos.

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And the winner is…
But first a word from our sponsor…You! Hey, you, click on some of those ads off to the side and keep this blog a rolling. Rolling, Rolling, Rolling.
Now back to Billie Crystal as he announces the best player pickup in the off season…
Drum roll ta ta ta ta tata.
Richard Jefferson by the San Antonio Spurs.
Come on up Richard.

Congratulations and guess why you were number 1?

Jefferson (14 votes)
The first big move of the offseason will prove to be the best move, more than one-quarter of our voters said. RJ is the piece that will get the Spurs back into the West’s elite. Jefferson’s shooting numbers were down last season with the Bucks, but he shot 40 percent from beyond the arc and still knows how to score. Playing in a winning atmosphere certainly will help matters, too.

Most important, perhaps, is that RJ has been healthy for the past two years — something the Spurs’ big three has not been — and he’s still on the right side of 30. If he proves to be the perfect fit, the Spurs could push the Lakers for the Western Conference crown.

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Duncan will have Richard Jefferson to help him to the NBA Title

Squibster take: This one stood out for me, because Richard Jefferson has been a quality player on a couple of confused teams. Now he won’t have to be the team leader. The Spurs have plenty of those guys. He can do what he does best and slash to the basket. Spurs may be once again looking at NBA title contention.

O’Neal to the Cav’s – does Shaq have enough left in the tank?
Artest to the Lakers – can Phil Jackson handle this guy? If he does then Phil goes to the Hall of Fame without retiring.
Carter to Orlando – Plenty of O, but will he deliver the D?
Marion, Miller, Turkoglu, and Wallace round out the field with Rasheed to the Celtics maybe paying the biggest dividends.

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While Blake’s brother attempts to land a National Basketball League job, Blake is voted to be the future Rookie of the Year by ESPN online. The Clippers are so fired up about Blake Griffin that they fired the human black hole, Zach Randolph. Even though it is hard to criticize any former Michigan State Spartans, Zach rarely gives back a pass to him in the post, even if he is double teamed.

(Full Disclosure: Your intrepid author is a Michigan State Spartan Alumni. Go Tom Izzo.)

The Clippers now can give Blake all the playing time he needs to develop into the star player many think he will become down the road.

Blake is so happy to hear he was voted pre season ROY

While the Clippers’ trade of Zach Randolph cleared the way for Griffin to step right in and get minutes, their new power forward has some history working against him: (1) only two of the past 10 No. 1 picks have won Rookie of the Year, and (2) no Clipper has ever won the award, despite the franchise’s near-permanent residence in Lotteryland. (The Buffalo Braves, the original incarnation of the Clips, did have back-to-back winners in 1973 and 1974: Bob McAdoo and Ernie DiGregorio.)

Those tendencies notwithstanding, most of our voters believe Griffin’s dominance at Oklahoma will translate into success in L.A.
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If Blake became even half as good as either Bob McAdoo or Ernie DiGregorio, the Clippers would be more than happy. Both players were stars in the NBA.

Other players in the running for the award include Hasheem Thabeet, James Harden, Jonny Flynn, and Stephen Curry. Keep in mind, not a single NBA game has been played yet. These votes were largely based on reputation and summer league. Once the season does begin many more factors will play into the ROY vote, including amount of playing time granted and injuries.

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