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True Hoop
True Hoop (myespn.go.com) has great Phoenix Suns news, photos, videos and more
Friday, Jan 2
Friday Bullets
The new-look Bobcats are 4-5 since the big trade. Queen City Hoops says that Boris Diaw deserves some of the credit, but that much of the progress can be chalked up to the upward trajectory of Emeka Okafor and Gerald Wallace since the deal: "Since Boris' arrival, Gerald has been unreal - 20.8 p...
First Cup: Friday
Mark Murphy of the Boston Herald: "In a statement released Wednesday, the league finally admitted the officiating crew of Mike Callahan, Rodney Mott and Zach Zarba erred in its handling of a controversial play during the Celtics 91-86 loss in Portland on Tuesday. A basket by Blazers forw...
Tuesday, Dec 30
Tuesday Bullets
Posted by Kevin Arnovitz If you read one item today, make it Tom Ziller's "Vortex of Suck" exegesis. Ziller uses a few different variables -- the Potential, Performance, and Assets of the league's worst squads -- to determine "the Bleakest Team in the NBA," the Charlotte Bobcats. Mike D'An...
Friday, Dec 26
That Last 7.7 Seconds in Phoenix
Again, Nash set a nice back pick on Michael Finley, who was guarding Grant Hill, and Tony Parker decided against switching onto Hill. That left Hill wide open for a go-ahead layup after Amare hit him with another beautiful pass from up high.
Thursday, Dec 25
Live-Blogging: San Antonio at Phoenix
11:54 AM: Re: Oberto as defensive relief down low. Make that Kurt Thomas. 12:18 PM: As Henry pointed out in these parts just a week or so ago, "Video breakdown of how Shaquille O'Neal hurt the Knicks. I've said it before, I'll say it again: Few big men pass as well as he does."
Wednesday, Dec 24
First Cup: Wednesday
Monique Walker of The Boston Globe: "Looking for a little perspective on this season's Celtics? They are owners of the longest winning streak in franchise history at 19 games and own the NBA record for the best start at 27-2. No other Celtics teams can say that. But leave it to Paul Pierce to th...
Christmas Eve/Erev Yontif Bullets
Two of the best in the business -- CelticsBlog and Forum Blue & Gold -- host a Q & A exchange on the eve of the big game. CelticsBlog shares the recipe for "The Rondo Cocktail."Michael Schwartz of Valley of the Suns "sometimes wonder[s] why Nash doesn't shoot the basketball m...
Tuesday, Dec 23
Not the Worst Defensive Coach Out There: Mike D'Antoni
And, if you look at points allowed per game, D'Antoni's teams have allowed, in recent seasons, astronomically high numbers like 103, 105, or (the Knicks right now) 108 points per game. The other really important thing to note: In D'Antoni's last season in Phoenix, his team allowed 105 poi...
Tuesday Bullets
Sort of a slow day, huh? I get the feeling everybody is sitting in traffic, or shoveling snow, or buying discounted retail goods. A small number of bullets for a slow day: After today, I'll be taking some time off until, oh, next year, but TrueHoop never rests. Kevin Arnovitz will be here, and t...
Monday, Dec 22
First Cup: Monday
Chris McCosky of The Detroit News" "Like the Lions, the Pistons remain perfect on Sunday -- perfectly winless, 0-6."Bob Finnan of The News-Herald: "LeBron James was asked when he started tossing up rosin before games. 'I always put the chalk on my hands, for whatever reason, to get my hands...
Friday, Dec 19
Friday Bullets
Fans.Judging by PER, Sam Cassell has been better than maybe Hall of Fame guards.The Jazz have noticed that the ball tends not to come to you, so it's good to get players who go get the ball.The Bucks and Sixers managed to play a game in which no stars played well. Frank Madden from BrewHoop: "A game...
Brandon Roy's 52, in Bullets
Jason Richardson was the guy who was supposed to stop Brandon Roy. Most of the night it was on him. But, like a lot of teams that face Portland these days, the Suns did a little double-teaming down the stretch. But what really occured to me is that not all double teams are created equal. Many teams h...
First Cup: Friday
Jason Quick of The Oregonian: "If there has ever been a finer performance at the Rose Garden, somebody find it, because no one who was in attendance Thursday night will ever believe there was a greater game played than that of Trail Blazers guard Brandon Roy. Roy scored 52 points -- the secon...
Thursday, Dec 18
First Cup: Thursday
Mark Bradley of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: "The difference is that the Hawks aren't yet skilled enough to make the elegantly simple plays Kevin Garnett makes as a matter of course. ('Anything to sell some tickets,' was Garnett's postgame appraisal of the program cover.) The Celt...
Wednesday, Dec 17
Wednesday Bullets
If you wanted to hear some guffaws, get some real deal basketball experts together and have them watch the closing minutes of last night's Bulls vs. Bobcats game. Seldom have I seen three entities -- the two teams and the officials -- compete so diligently for the "most disappointing perfor...
Tuesday, Dec 16
Tuesday Bullets
Mike D'Antoni says that he'll watch film at halftime, and if he sees that some call he yelled at the refs for was indeed a good call, he'll 'fess up when they're all back on the court. He tells Jonathan Abrams of The New York Times: "I'll do it all the time. They've got to know I'm whacked out. Not bec...
First Cup: Tuesday
Ailene Voisin of the Sacramento Bee: "Kenny Natt doesn't need to read the fine print. He knows what his job is. He's the temp who occupies the seat until his replacement is hired, which in the current economic climate, means sometime next summer. But please. No more rookies, no more neophytes,...
Monday, Dec 15
Monday Bullets
Casey Wasserman is mostly known around the NBA as the rich young man who is, as the founder of the Wasserman Media Group, Arn Tellem's boss. He's also, I just learned today, on the board of Bill Clinton's foundation, and a major force behind trying to get the 50th Super Bowl to Los Angeles.Oh ma...
First Cup: Monday
Ronald Tillery of the Memphis Commercial Appeal: "At 32 years old and with several checkered spots on his 13-year resume, Antoine Walker isn't exactly meeting infamous expectations. So the Grizzlies should stop wasting everyone's time and give Walker his freedom. A contract buyout sho...
Thursday, Dec 11
Jason Richardson: Happy
There are high expectations in Phoenix. You can see what the roster has with Amar'e, Shaq, Steve. Those guys are future Hall of Famers. I'm very excited to play alongside guys like that for the first time in my career. I've never played on a team like this. I've always been on re-building teams. I'v...
First Cup: Thursday
Rick Bonnell of The Charlotte Observer: "An executive from another NBA team called my cell phone around nine tonight, to make this quite unsolicited comment on the Bobcats trade: Huh?!?! The guy couldn't imagine how, empirically, the Bobcats have more talent now than they did before de...
Wednesday, Dec 10
A Spark for the Suns
When I watch the Suns, I see a team that, more than anything, needs to be healthier, younger, and more athletic. When there is a loose ball on the floor, I almost don't want the likes of Nash, Bell, Diaw, Grant Hill, or Shaquille O'Neal to dive for it, for fear they will break on impact.
Wednesday Bullets
Mark McLane of Black Jesus Disciples with a super fantastic Jerry Colangelo story: "Years ago, I worked for The Home Depot. A coworker of mine was an older gentleman whose retirement hadn't quite stuck the way he hoped. Bored out of his mind sitting around the house, he decided to don a hideou...
Friday, Dec 5
Great Player, Great Man, Tough News
Here are some highlights of his career. He was once the NBA's Sixth man of the year, and played for the Nuggets, Clippers, Suns, Celtics, Nets, Hornets and 76ers. In one stint as a Nugget, he averaged about a point a second for nearly ten seconds.
Phoenix in the First Half
Pace is only slightly different between halves, so that's not it.They are actually much more efficient in points per possession on offense in the second half (and give up higher points per possession as well in the second half ... that can partly be the garbage time effects of blowouts leading...
Forlorn Sun, via Twitter
In the last few hours, the "Real Shaq," widely reported to be Shaquille O'Neal, has written: And: Whatthe hell is wrong wit da suns More confirmation of what Steve Nash told ESPN's Marc Stein last night: "Right now, we're in a dark place." The Suns lost badly to the Mavericks last night.
First Cup: Friday
Michael Grange of the Globe and Mail: "One of the most accomplished players in Canadian basketball history, Jay Triano, 50, will make his debut as the Toronto Raptors' bench boss tonight in Salt Lake against the Utah Jazz, becoming the first Canadian-born head coach in the NBA. Those in th...
Thursday, Dec 4
Thursday Bullets
The Houston Chronicle is sticking it to Tracy McGrady.TrueHoop reader Brennan makes a really interesting point, which I'll paraphrase. We have all seen this a thousand times. Two opponents are chasing a ball as it heads out of bounds. One leaps for the ball, as the other steps out of bounds. The...
Wednesday, Dec 3
One of Life's Little Mysteries
Paul Coro of the Arizona Republic writes: The Suns pharaoh of factoids, Vince Kozar, brings us this breakdown of Suns' turnovers: They average 9.7 in first halves and 6.8 in second halves. What in the heck is that about? Another theory: Does Shaquille O'Neal play more in the first half?
First Cup: Wednesday
Marc Berman of the New York Post: "'My father is looking down on me,' Stephon Marbury wrote in an e-mail to The Post last night. 'I know he is proud of the way that I'm trying to be a better man. I'm not perfect and I'm trying to be better than what I was yesterday. I want to say to all of the people who se...
Tuesday, Dec 2
First Cup: Tuesday
Geoffrey C. Arnold of The Oregonian: "The combination of mounting losses and frustrated owners has already resulted in two head coaches losing their jobs early in this NBA season. The firings -- likely just the beginning -- illustrate a shifting NBA environment in which team owners and ex...
Friday, Nov 21
Opinion: 13 Seconds or More
In the clutter of the Suns' new offense, Steve Nash looks like a hummingbird trapped inside a sandwich bag. Last night against the Lakers, there was an eight-minute stretch over the second and third quarters when nobody except Shaquille O'Neal recorded a single point for the Suns. Amazing...
Friday, Nov 14
Friday: First Cup
Mike McGraw of the Daily Herald: "Why did veteran guard Lindsey Hunter choose to join the Bulls less than three weeks before his 38th birthday? To hear him describe it, the family ties added up. For starters, his wife, Ivy, grew up on the South Side. 'I'm kind of a Chicago guy,' Hunter said befo...
Friday Afternoon Extra Bullety Things
Not to be outdone, on Hornets247 Ryan Schwan quotes some serious Shakespeare in a preview of tonight's Hornets vs. Blazers game: "For about six months I've had an urge to put together a post about Portland's Kevin Pritchard -- a man who is celebrated as "teh best GM evah" by many. I'm not actua...
Thursday, Nov 13
Thursday: First Cup
Bill Livingston of The Plain Dealer: "Whatever happened to the NBA's Magic vs. Bird rivalry of this century? Only five years ago, the Cavaliers' LeBron James and Denver's Carmelo Anthony were supposed to save the NBA, the way Larry Bird and Magic Johnson did until Michael Jordan came alon...
Tuesday, Nov 4
Tuesday Bullets
Valley of the Suns says that Matt Barnes has been an unlikely, but very serviceable, replacement for Shawn Marion: "Although Barnes is no Matrix, he fills many of the voids left by Marion's trade to Miami, while lessening a burden on Hill. The decision to play Barnes with the starters seems...
Friday, Oct 10
First Cup: Friday
Mike Wells of The Indianapolis Star "The Indiana Pacers have hired Calvin Hill as a consultant to help the team with its image reshaping. Hill, a former NFL running back and father of Phoenix Suns guard Grant Hill, will work with Sam Perkins, the Pacers vice president of player relations. Hi...
Friday, Aug 29
Amare Stoudemire, on a Mission
Los Angeles, CA)- NBA Star Phoenix Suns' Amare Stoudemire is taking a trip to Sierra Leone, West Africa on behalf of his foundation, Each 1, Teach 1, and the Zee Community Development Foundation (ZCD) on September 1-4 to unveil various project sites where he has donated money to rehabili...
Thursday, Aug 21
Thursday Bullets
A statistician takes a stab at figuring out how many points Kobe Bryant cost the Lakers by ball-hogging on the night he scored 81. 12, by the way. That's the answer. Passing more, says the Arbitrarian on Hardwood Paroxysm, would have delivered the Lakers 12 extra points in a game they won anywa...
Monday, Aug 18
Diamond ... or Rough? Suns Unearth Something in Dragic
But what if Steve Kerr and company are simply wrong? The lion's share of the minutes, however, will still be consumed by Nash, O'Neal, Amare Stoudemire, Raja Bell, Leandro Barbosa, Grant Hill, and Boris Diaw. Increasingly, that is seeming like it is not enough to win the tough West.
Tuesday, Jul 15
First Cup: Tuesday
Bob Young of The Arizona Republic: "David Stern needs to step down. His league's credibility depends on it. Former Suns Chairman Jerry Colangelo would make a pretty good replacement. If it is determined that Foster was involved with Donaghy, then Stern needs to take one more step. Remember w...
Friday, May 16
Friday Bullets
Suns reportedly interviewing Terry Porter, Mark Jackson, and Elston Turner. I'm pulling for my childhood hero, Terry Porter. But let's not forget, the Suns have a great guy, and a former head coach, on staff, too, in Alvin Gentry. I have to think he'll get consideration.Ron Artest not thinki...
First Cup: Friday
Celtics vs. Cavaliers Marc J. Spears of The Boston Globe: "The Celtics aren't doing anything dramatic to combat their playoff woes on the road. All the Celtics are focused on is finding the performance needed to end their second-round series in Game 6 tonight. The Celtics aren't the only team...
Tuesday, May 6
First Cup: Tuesday
Leaguewide Mike Downey of The Chicago Tribune: "Mike D'Antoni's team last season had a record of 55-27 and Avery Johnson's went 51-31 ... yet John Paxson has been given a pass by Phoenix and Dallas to take a shot at the open man of his choice. These are not has-beens. They aren't damaged cans from t...
Monday, May 5
The Real NBA Finals
It's not hard to make the case that the Phoenix vs. San Antonio series was when the NBA Championship was determined, making it the "real" NBA Finals. Which makes this that delightful rarity: a season when the real NBA Finals will be ... the real NBA Finals.
Thursday, May 1
Thursday Bullets
Warren Buffett recently found that he pays a lower tax rate than his receptionist. Then a business school professor found the same thing. On the Freakonomics blog, they are asking readers to assess the same thing for themselves. I'd be fascinated to see someone in the NBA pick up this theme: w...
Wednesday, Apr 30
Celtics vs. Hawks Thoughts
When the playoffs started, there were two series which were clear cut. The two best teams to make the playoffs -- Boston and Detroit -- against the two worst teams to make the playoffs -- Atlanta and Philadelphia. Amazingly, those were also the only two series to even make it to 2-2. All the rest...
Phoenix: Out of Time
Shaquille O'Neal didn't hit his free throws. Tim Duncan nailed an improbable three-pointer. Steve Nash made uncharacteristic turnovers. Boris Diaw lobbed a key pass out of bounds. The Suns had those suspensions last year, when Steve Nash was also hurt. Leandro Barbosa went cold. Amare was in...
First Cup: Wednesday
Jeff Kaplan of the Star Telegram: "A late-night party to celebrate Josh Howard's 28th birthday after Sunday's Game 4 loss turned Dallas Mavericks coach Avery Johnson livid and led him to cancel Monday's practice, two sources confirmed. Johnson, who stressed no partying during the seri...
Friday, Apr 25
Friday Bullets
David Stern has been saying that they are satisfied Clay Bennett and the owners from Oklahoma City have honored their obligation to make a good faith best effort to keep the Sonics in Seattle. But those private emails keep becoming public, and now we learn the league's top lawyer, and Clay B...
Monday, Apr 21
Suns vs. Spurs Bullets - ESPN
Suns vs. Spurs Bullets ESPN - Apr 21, 2008 They won't play well in Phoenix. Greatness finds a way. 'I'm not going to change my game,' O'Neal said after Game 1 of Suns-Spurs, 'so hopefully they let me ...
Thursday, Apr 17
First Cup: Thursday
Buck Harvey of the San Antonio Express-News: "A year ago, the Spurs and Suns drew blood and anger, and now one franchise will feel disgust and failure within two weeks. Duncan has never known this kind of loss. He's been the opposite of Tracy McGrady, getting out of the first round every year h...
Wednesday, Apr 16
Wednesday Bullets
Baron Davis's agent says his client is unlikley to opt out of his contract, as he is guaranteed more than almost any other team can offer. The view that Don Nelson was wrong for benching Baron Davis for the last two important quarters of the year. And the view that Nelson was well within his righ...
Tuesday, Apr 15
Tuesday Bullets
Jefferson George of The Charlotte Observer quotes Bobcats owner Bob Johnson on his relationship with co-owner Michael Jordan: "Helping with marketing and promotions cuts into Jordan's personal time, Johnson said, and 'Michael, in his mind, divides his business from his personal. He...
Monday, Apr 14
A Four-Way Tie Would be Magnificent
As far as individual tiebreakers go, the Spurs have a better division record than Houston, Phoenix owns the season series against San Antonio and Houston has a better conference record than Phoenix. Round and round we go. If it comes down to conference record, the Jazz would finish 34-18, H...
Wednesday, Mar 5
Podcast: Wednesday Bullets
A Stephon Marbury sighting at the Knicks training facility.The Star-Ledger's Dave D'Alessandro on why Sean Williams isn't playing more: "Sean isn't doing anything intentional to tick off anybody, outside of the fact that he can't defend pick-and-rolls like he's supposed to, can't pl...
Friday, Feb 22
First Cup: Friday
Sam Smith of The Chicago Tribune: "For the Bulls, this is just the beginning. The rebuilding is under way. The Bulls must have noticed it's nearly March and they still are 11 games below .500. They are entering perhaps the most difficult part of their schedule, with Denver at the beginning of it...
