Basketball

Subterms

    More stories

    • 100 Shares159 Views

      in Basket

      Carmelo Anthony Retires From NBA After 19 Seasons

      by

      Anthony, known as one of the top scorers in league history, had struggled in recent years and did not play the 2022-23 season.Carmelo Anthony, the former Knicks star and one of the greatest scorers in N.B.A. history, announced his retirement on Monday, calling the farewell after 19 seasons “bittersweet.”Anthony, 38, last played in April 2022 as a reserve for the Los Angeles Lakers and spent the final few seasons of his career in more limited roles.“Now the time has come for me to say goodbye, to the court where I made my name, to the game that gave me purpose and pride,” Anthony said in a glossily produced video posted to social networks on Monday. The video included career highlights, with the song “All That I Got Is You” by Ghostface Killah featuring Mary J. Blige in the background.Anthony said he was “excited about what the future holds.”Thank you #STAYME7O pic.twitter.com/4au8cOd13s— Carmelo Anthony (@carmeloanthony) May 22, 2023
      The Denver Nuggets drafted Anthony third overall out of Syracuse in 2003 after he led the school to a Division I N.C.A.A. national championship. Anthony might have been drafted higher if not for a player he would form a close friendship with: LeBron James, who went first overall to Cleveland.Anthony immediately demonstrated his prowess for scoring. His elite footwork, burly physique and quick release on his jumper from anywhere on the court made him difficult to guard. Paul Pierce, the Hall of Famer, said earlier this year that he would have rather guarded Kobe Bryant or James than Anthony.Anthony led the Nuggets to the playoffs in his rookie year. He jab-stepped, up-faked and posted up his way to 10 All-Star Games and six All-N.B.A. teams. Anthony ended his career with 28,289 total points — good for ninth in N.B.A. history. He also won three Olympic gold medals and one bronze.Anthony against LeBron James in 2012. Both players were drafted in 2003, with James picked first overall and Anthony picked third.Barton Silverman/The New York TimesMany Knicks fans are particularly fond of Anthony, who was born in Brooklyn and pressured the Nuggets to trade him to New York in 2011 so he could team up with a fellow All-Star, Amar’e Stoudemire. The move gave the fan base some optimism after a decade of incompetence from the front office.The partnership never fully bore fruit, thanks mainly to injuries to Stoudemire. But Anthony did provide memorable performances at Madison Square Garden, including a game in 2014 in which he scored 62 points, a franchise record. Anthony also led the Knicks to one of their only playoff series wins of the century, in 2013 against the Boston Celtics.All told, Anthony played for six teams: the Nuggets, Knicks, Oklahoma City Thunder, Houston Rockets, Portland Trail Blazers and Lakers.Anthony’s career had several speed bumps.He developed a reputation for lax defense and hogging the ball. His former Nuggets coach, George Karl, wrote in his 2017 memoir that Anthony “only played hard on one side of the ball.” And while Anthony’s teams reliably made the playoffs, he made it as far as the conference finals only once, in 2009 with the Nuggets.Anthony with the Denver Nuggets in 2011.Amy Sancetta/Associated PressLike many All-Stars before him, Anthony struggled to adjust to a drop-off in his game as he entered the back half of his career. After the Knicks traded him to Oklahoma City before the 2017-18 season, he appeared to have the best chance of his career to win a championship because he was teaming up with Paul George and Russell Westbrook, perennial All-Stars. But he scoffed at the idea of coming off the bench, and many fans blamed him when the team fizzled out early in the playoffs.Soon, Anthony’s career was hanging in the balance. He appeared in just 10 games for Houston in the 2018-19 season before he was sidelined and later traded to Chicago, though he never played in any games for the Bulls and was quickly waived. He revitalized his career in Portland over the next two seasons by accepting the bench role that he had laughed at in Oklahoma City. He ended his career playing next to James in Los Angeles.Off the court, Anthony became increasingly outspoken on social issues, including police violence, after appearing in a homemade video titled “Stop Snitching” early in his career. The video discouraged people from talking to the police about crimes.After George Floyd was murdered by a police officer in 2020, Anthony formed a philanthropic investment fund with Chris Paul and Dwyane Wade to invest in communities of color, as well as to push for causes like changes to the criminal justice system.In his retirement video, Anthony said that he did not believe his legacy to be his on-court feats because his “story has always been more than basketball.”“My legacy? My son,” Anthony said, addressing his teenage son, Kiyan Anthony. He added: “Chase your dreams. Let nothing hold you back. Let nothing intervene. My legacy now and forever lives on through you.” More

    • 163 Shares199 Views

      in Basket

      Jimmy Butler and the Miami Heat Have the Boston Celtics on the Ropes

      by

      Butler has shaped the Miami Heat in his no-quit, self-assured image, which is bad news for a reeling Boston team that is one loss from elimination in the Eastern Conference finals.MIAMI — For much of Game 3 of the N.B.A.’s Eastern Conference finals on Sunday, Jimmy Butler did something he does not often do: He played a supporting role. He created off the dribble, zipped passes to his Heat teammates for open shots and pushed to score only when the opportunity made too much sense not to seize it.Butler could have easily tried to take over against the reeling Boston Celtics. But he has shaped the Heat in his no-quit, self-assured image, and empowered their cast of unsung players to lead. Then, shortly before halftime on Sunday, as if anyone needed to be reminded of his presence, Butler dribbled the ball upcourt and went straight at the Celtics’ Grant Williams, his latest nemesis, for a jumper off the glass.After drawing a foul on the shot for good measure, Butler fell to his back and stayed there for longer than was necessary — just so he could point at Williams and make it clear that he had made him look foolish, again.“In all the moments of truth,” Heat Coach Erik Spoelstra said, “Jimmy is going to put his will on the game.”Another game, another clinic given by Miami, whose 128-102 victory on Sunday was an end-to-end drubbing. The Heat, who have a 3-0 series lead, will go for the sweep at home on Tuesday, driven by their increasingly credible championship dreams as an eighth seed.The Celtics looked lost in Game 3 as they fell behind the Heat by as many as 33 points.Megan Briggs/Getty ImagesThe Celtics’ Jaylen Brown called the Game 3 loss “embarrassing.” Boston Coach Joe Mazzulla took the blame. “I just didn’t have them ready to play,” he said.All things considered, it was a muted performance by Butler, who finished with 16 points, 8 rebounds and 6 assists. But for the first time in the series, he faced traps. Both he and Bam Adebayo found teammates who were willing to help. Gabe Vincent scored 29 points, and Duncan Robinson finished with 22.“Jimmy and Bam are fueling that,” Spoelstra said. “They are just infusing those guys with confidence.”It would be easy to describe Butler as a showman, as someone who turns the court into a stage. He is not an impassive person. He emotes. He interacts with opposing players. He sings to himself. And he seems to delight in those moments (plural) when a crowded arena awaits his next act.Make no mistake: There is a theatrical element to his approach, especially in the playoffs. It was on full display in Game 2 on Friday, after Williams connected on a 3-pointer to build on Boston’s narrow lead midway through the fourth quarter. Williams began jawing with Butler on his way back up the court. On the ensuing possession, Butler scored on Williams and drew a foul. Afterward, Butler and Williams knocked foreheads as they continued their — how to put this delicately? — conversation.“l like that,” Butler said. “I’m all for that. It makes me key in a lot more. It pushes that will that I have to win a lot more. It makes me smile. When people talk to me, I’m like, OK, I know I’m a decent player if you want to talk to me out of everybody that you can talk to.”Butler and Boston’s Grant Williams had a fiery exchange during Game 2 on Friday. Adam Glanzman/Getty ImagesFor Williams, talking to Butler was a miscalculation. The Heat closed that game with a 24-9 run. After the win, Butler strode to his news conference crooning along to “Somebody’s Problem,” a song by the country artist Morgan Wallen, which Butler was playing on his iPhone.“It’s a hit in the locker room right now,” said Butler, who described himself as the team D.J. “So I get to pick and choose what we listen to.”The thing about Butler, though, is that all his extracurriculars — and all the attention that he draws to himself, whether intentional or not — are a means to an end. They motivate him, push him to perform. He is not brash for the sake of being brash. He is brash because being brash helps him win.“He loves to win,” said Mike Marquis, who was his coach at Tyler Junior College, a two-year school about 100 miles southeast of Dallas. “Some people hate to lose. He absolutely loves to win. I think sometimes there’s a negative connotation with hating to lose, with bad sportsmanship and all that. But when I coached him, he didn’t have any of that — he just loved to win.”Butler, who had a difficult childhood, was not highly recruited coming out of Tomball High School in Texas. He had a scholarship offer from Centenary, a small college in Louisiana that has since transitioned to Division III, and a partial offer from Quinnipiac. But Tyler, Butler said, was where he felt wanted.Joe Fulce, a teammate of his at Tyler and later at Marquette, recalled that Butler had an uncanny ability to “curate his own world” whenever he played basketball. Outside the gym, there were problems and challenges. Inside the gym, the many distractions of his daily life somehow ceased to exist.“That’s hard as hell to do,” Fulce said. “It’s almost like he was a magician.”Butler amped up the crowd during Game 3.Megan Briggs/Getty ImagesMarquis caught another glimpse of that single-minded focus when the N.B.A. concluded its 2019-20 season inside a spectator-free bubble at Walt Disney World because of the coronavirus pandemic. While other players were going stir crazy, Butler thrived in that sort of insulated environment, hauling the fifth-seeded Heat to the N.B.A. finals before they lost to the Los Angeles Lakers in six games.Today, Butler is one of the league’s most recognizable players and a global pitchman for a low-calorie beer. But he still finds a way to close himself off from the world around him whenever he plays basketball, and he is not all that dissimilar to many of his teammates who were overlooked until they found success in Miami. The Heat have nine undrafted players on their roster, including Vincent and Robinson.Butler went to junior college. He was the final pick of the first round of the 2011 N.B.A. draft. Even this season, he was not selected as an All-Star (which, in hindsight, was probably an oversight). The veteran guard Kyle Lowry has said Butler is one of the most unselfish stars he has played with.“He is us, and we are him,” Spoelstra told reporters earlier in the postseason, as a way of explaining the synergy between Butler and the team around him. “Sometimes, the psychotic meets the psychotic.”Together, they are one win from the N.B.A. finals. More

    • 100 Shares169 Views

      in Basket

      Nikola Jokic Has Mastered the Art of Slowness

      by

      Providing unhurried but timely play, Jokic, the two-time most valuable player, has the Denver Nuggets on the cusp of the N.B.A. finals.LOS ANGELES — After watching Nikola Jokic repeatedly lumber down the court, hold a basketball above the defense like a freshly picked grapefruit, wheel, pause, and sling a tightrope pass that led a teammate to an open shot, a question came to mind.What is the best one-word descriptor for this guy, a player steadily distinguishing himself as unlike any in N.B.A. history, now on the verge of taking the Denver Nuggets to the finals?Is Jokic …Fundamental? Yeah, that partly hits the mark.Is Jokic …Efficient? Hmm, there’s more than a kernel of truth in that.Is he …Intelligent? That’s true, though it’s an assessment that comes with baggage. Jokic is white, and, yeah, he’s a physicist on the court, but so are LeBron James and a host of Black players who do not get nearly enough credit for their smarts.What about …Slow? Well, now we are on to something. Here we find his special sauce.It is the speed with which he plays, or, rather, the lack of it, that sets him apart in the fast-twitch N.B.A. Jokic, the two-time league most valuable player, could write an instructional book about the game he has come to master: Basketball and the Fine Art of Slowness.This particular faculty is not entirely about sprinting pace. Jokic can move fairly quickly in spurts. It is just as much qualitative. When he is on the court, no matter the circumstance, he seems to control time. He moves where he wants, when he wants, while every other player is slicing around the court in a frenzy.On Saturday night, as the Nuggets and Lakers starters gathered on the court at Crypto.com Arena before tipoff in Game 3 of the Western Conference finals, it seemed like every other player was jumping up and down or fiddling nervously with their uniform or hunting for someone to high-five.Jokic just stood at center court, focused, waiting. It brought to mind something Jeff Van Gundy, the former N.B.A. head coach who is now a television analyst for ESPN, told me before the game, describing the towering Serb. “He looks completely unruffled. Jokic is the epitome of the John Wooden quote, ‘Be quick, don’t hurry.’”“He’s an absolute marvel,” Van Gundy added.Wait, this guy, a marvel? Jokic is muscular but hardly ripped. He stands nearly 7 feet, weighs almost as much as a subzero refrigerator, and has arms that might as well be pterodactyl wings. He is 28, still in the middle of the prime years for physical prowess, but he might trip while trying to jump over the Sunday paper.And yet he dominates the N.B.A.He has been a presiding force in this season’s playoffs, his consistently high level of play matched only by Miami Heat guard Jimmy Butler. Seven triple-doubles in 14 games. Six games with more than 30 points. A 53-point masterpiece against Phoenix in the conference semifinals. Then he practically won Game 1 against the Lakers by himself.But as Game 3 of that series began on Saturday, Jokic struggled to find a rhythm. Uncharacteristically, he scuffled for a while, and was saddled by foul trouble. Then, with the Lakers briefly taking an 85-84 lead early in the fourth quarter and James beginning to recall his younger self, a switch went on inside Jokic.Suddenly, there it was, the whole arsenal. Deflections, rebounds and orbital jump shots. Scooping, angling passes. Jokic dribbled up the court, a commanding, surveying point guard. He methodically backed down a Lakers defender. Time seemed to grind to something near a standstill. Then Jokic spun, twirled, and sped briefly to the basket to knock in a soft layup as if it were a one-inch putt.This was Zen: Wait patiently, clear the mind, calm the body, see the opening, strike. That’s Jokic.When Jokic is on the court, no matter the circumstance, he seems to control time. Jayne Kamin-Oncea/USA Today Sports, via Reuters ConDenver pulled away, Jokic (and his sidekick Jamal Murray) in full flight. When Jokic catapulted in a 25-foot 3-pointer with about three minutes left, the Nuggets surged ahead by 10 points. Eventually they won, 119-108.How did he become such a master?Jokic turned pro 11 years ago in his native Serbia when he was a rawboned 17-year-old. His coach, Dejan Milojevic, now an assistant with the Golden State Warriors, recalls Jokic operating in those days with the same uncanny understanding. He moved without haste, at what Milojevic prefers to call “the speed optimum for Nikola.”What Jokic needed, at least at the start of his professional career, was the strength or stamina to prosper. His old coach claims that Jokic had to undergo a crash conditioning course because he couldn’t complete even two push-ups. Once he got in shape, the blossoming began.But getting in shape and being well coached can’t be the whole story. If so, there would be 1,000 players like Jokic.Is there something about how he is wired?“The way he tracks information around him, knowing where everybody is on the court, making perfectly timed passes all the time to open teammates, takes a special mental ability,” said Greg Appelbaum, director of the Human Performance Optimization Lab at U.C. San Diego, where scientists study athletes’ cognition.“Prospective inference” Appelbaum called Jokic’s capacity to stay one, two, and sometimes three steps ahead of the action on a 94-by-50-foot hardwood swath.Prospective what?An analogy can be found in a cheetah’s amplified ability to scan terrain and extrapolate the possible escape routes of prey. In sports, it’s the skill to predict the future movements of opponents and teammates, said Appelbaum, shortly after watching Denver’s Game 3 win. “It sure looked like Jokic did that tonight.”It did, indeed.Of course, no matter the cause of his mastery, none of it happens if Jokic takes himself off balance by rushing. That’s the foundation.Speed defines our society. Faster, faster, faster is the mantra — sometimes for the better and, as it is becoming increasingly clear, often for the worse. But watching Nikola Jokic provides an antidote: the enduring power of taking one’s time. More

    • 113 Shares159 Views

      in Basket

      Denver Nuggets Role Players Get to Be Stars, Too

      by

      The Nuggets can sweep the Lakers in the Western Conference finals, and it’s not just because of Nikola Jokic and Jamal Murray. The role players have been just as important.LOS ANGELES — To win a championship in the N.B.A., a team almost always needs at least one transcendent player.But the championship journey will also depend on how well a team’s role players do their jobs.The Lakers, with 17 titles, know this well. Would they have won in 2010 without Metta Sandiford-Artest, or in 2002 without Robert Horry? Shaquille O’Neal, who won three championships for the Lakers with Kobe Bryant, often talks about the importance of the “others” — the players who aren’t stars.The Lakers franchise has found itself on the unpleasant side of the calculus this year. In the Western Conference finals against Denver, Los Angeles has the weaker supporting cast. The Nuggets, who lead the best-of-seven series, 3-0, are not just beating the Lakers with the talents of Nikola Jokic, a two-time N.B.A. most valuable player, or Jamal Murray, their dynamic guard. Aaron Gordon’s toughness, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope’s poise, Bruce Brown’s versatility and Michael Porter Jr.’s persistence are helping them get it done.On Monday, the Nuggets will try to complete a sweep of the Lakers to go to the franchise’s first N.B.A. finals. There have certainly been moments when Jokic and Murray have carried Denver, but a critical part of the Nuggets’ success is that they haven’t always had to do that. When Murray and Jokic ebb, the team’s role-players flow, and together they beat back any tide the Lakers have sent at them.Nuggets Coach Michael Malone said forward Aaron Gordon had “checked his ego” to fulfill his role for the team.Mark J. Terrill/Associated Press“There’s a lot of guys that can go get it,” Gordon said. “So we just go with the hot guy.”Jokic is the engine that powers the Nuggets, but Gordon also called him “one of the most unselfish basketball players.” Jokic is averaging a triple-double in the playoffs, with 29.9 points, 13.2 rebounds and 10.1 assists per game. But even when he isn’t at his best, his mere presence changes the game. That happened on Saturday, in the Nuggets’ 119-108 win in Game 3 with the Lakers. Jokic had just 5 points and 2 rebounds at halftime, then got into foul trouble by committing his fourth less than halfway through the third quarter.“There wasn’t a panic,” Nuggets Coach Michael Malone said. “It was: ‘OK, he’s out. That means somebody else has to step up.’ I think that’s something our team has done time and time again.”The Nuggets’ players have not just accepted roles that require them to defer to others, but embraced them in service of winning a championship. Jokic was the team’s only All-Star this year and no Nugget made an All-Defensive team; Jokic has never played with someone who made those teams while playing with him.On Saturday, Caldwell-Pope scored 12 points in a critical third quarter when Jokic was in foul trouble and Murray had cooled off after scoring 30 points in the first half.The last time Caldwell-Pope played in the Western Conference finals, it was 2020 and he was a Laker tasked with defending Murray. The Lakers beat Denver to win the West, then bested Miami to win the title. Caldwell-Pope knows what it will take for Denver to win this year.“We’re No. 1 in the West for a reason,” Caldwell-Pope said. “I believed it from the jump that we could win a championship. That was everybody’s mind-set. We knew how we could jell together and play together.”Bruce Brown had 15 points for Denver off the bench in Game 3.Ashley Landis/Associated PressDenver’s Jeff Green, who played 23 minutes on Saturday, has been on nine teams in the past eight seasons. Porter, whom the Nuggets drafted in the first round in 2018, missed most of last season with a back injury. He scored 14 points and led the Nuggets with 10 rebounds on Saturday. Brown, who had 15 points off the bench, signed with Denver last summer.Gordon, drafted fourth overall by Orlando in 2014, was once best known for his impressive showing in the league’s dunk contests. His stats on Saturday didn’t look all that impressive — 7 points, 3 rebounds and 4 assists — but his defensive contributions were key. He blocked a shot late in the third quarter that helped the Nuggets maintain the lead.“He has checked his ego at the door,” Malone said. “He knew coming into this year with Jamal and Michael back that his role would be different, and he never fought that.”That isn’t always the case on ambitious teams, and this N.B.A. season provided examples of the friction that can emerge. Golden State’s younger players, for example, clamored for more playing time. But Denver, which led the West for much of the season, is an example of how good it can be when the system works.“Everybody realizes when we need something, we need a spark,” Murray said. “Could be Joker, could be me, could be Bruce, Jeff off the bench — whether it’s a chase-down block or a charge or something. Everybody has something they can come in and impact the game with.”The Lakers were another example of a team that struggled to satisfy everyone in their roles this season. In February, they traded away Russell Westbrook, who had been unhappy in a bench role. He had joined the team less than two years ago in a multi-team deal that also sent Caldwell-Pope to the Washington Wizards from Los Angeles. Moving on from Westbrook was part of a larger effort to add several new role players, who have had many electrifying games. But against the Nuggets their shortcomings have been clear.The Lakers’ role players struggled in Game 3. D’Angelo Russell, left, was just 1 of 8 from the field.Ashley Landis/Associated PressThe starkest example was D’Angelo Russell, who scored just 3 points on 1-of-8 shooting in Game 3 and committed three turnovers.Lakers Coach Darvin Ham could offer only this about the performances of the Lakers’ role players: “I thought they did the best they could, all of them.”But sometimes it takes more, like what Sandiford-Artest gave the Lakers in the 2010 N.B.A. finals against Boston.In Game 7, Bryant, the team’s leading scorer during the regular season and the playoffs, made only 6 of 24 shots. The Lakers had mostly relied on Sandiford-Artest for his defense as a past defensive player of the year, but in that game he scored 20 points and hit a crucial 3-pointer with less than a minute left.On Saturday, Sandiford-Artest sat across from the Lakers’ bench, a powerful reminder of how important role players can be to win a championship. More

    • 100 Shares129 Views

      in Basket

      What Gilbert Arenas Wants Ja Morant to Know

      by

      Gilbert Arenas’s N.B.A. career never recovered after he brought guns into a locker room. Now he’s puzzled by the gun troubles of Morant, the star Memphis Grizzlies guard.Gilbert Arenas figured it was an old video. There was no way, he thought, Ja Morant could have done the same thing so soon after his mea culpa. Not with all that was at stake.“Once I realized it was a new one, there was nothing else to say,” Arenas, the former Washington Wizards star, said, adding: “The fact that you keep wanting to do the things you’re doing, then you must want to see how invincible you think you are.”Morant, a 23-year-old Memphis Grizzlies guard, is facing criticism for the second time in just over two months for a social media video that appeared to show him playfully but recklessly waving around a gun in public. The N.B.A. verified the first video, in March, but is still investigating the second, which went viral last weekend. Morant apologized Tuesday.Arenas, 41, can relate to Morant’s turmoil better than almost anyone. In the 2009-10 season, the N.B.A. suspended him for 50 games for bringing guns into his team’s locker room and mocking the situation by making finger gun gestures at a game while the league was still investigating. Arenas, who had made three All-Star teams by then, said he got in trouble in a space where he felt comfortable — perhaps too comfortable.Gilbert Arenas was a three-time All-Star before he brought guns into his team’s locker room. He now hosts the “No Chill” podcast, where he often talks about lessons from his career.Richard Perry/The New York TimesThe N.B.A. suspended Arenas after he mocked the locker room incident with finger gun gestures during a game.Jesse D. Garrabrant/NBAE, via Nbae, via Getty Images“It’s different for me because I am not getting in trouble in my everyday life,” Arenas said. “I’m getting trouble at my workplace. The invisible cloud that I thought I had was removed.”Morant’s trouble has played out on social media, where he has millions of followers, and with much more at stake for his career and for the N.B.A. His otherworldly athleticism has made him a nightly highlight reel with legions of fans who have made his jersey one of the league’s best sellers. Morant released his first signature shoe with Nike this year, and was leading a new advertising campaign for Powerade. He was poised to be one of the young stars the N.B.A. relies on to carry the league forward after LeBron James and Stephen Curry retire. Now all of that is in jeopardy.Two videos. Two apologies, each with Morant vowing to be better.N.B.A. Commissioner Adam Silver suspended Morant for eight games after the first video, and said in an interview on ESPN on Tuesday that he was “shocked” when he saw the second. It’s unclear whether Morant broke any laws, but Silver, as he did in March, can suspend him for conduct deemed detrimental to the league. The Grizzlies, who were eliminated from the playoffs last month, have suspended Morant from team activities indefinitely.“He’s not only done a disservice to himself, but to the franchise,” said Larry Parnell, the director of the strategic public relations program at George Washington University. “And I think people take that more personally than they do politicians or actors who misbehave.”He explained why: “If you’re a celebrity and you make movies and I don’t like what you’re doing, I’m not emotionally attached to your movie, but I’m emotionally attached to the Celtics. I’m emotionally attached to the Grizzlies.”Arenas said that his situation contrasted with Morant’s because he was more aware that he was a public figure and acted accordingly, such as by not wearing flashy jewelry in public to avoid being robbed. “I understood I am not normal,” Arenas said.Nevertheless, Arenas’s gun incident overshadowed the rest of his N.B.A. career, which lasted only two more seasons, in part because of injuries. He was seen as immature.“I think it affected — I don’t even want to say legacy — my name,” said Arenas, who co-hosts the “Gil’s Arena” show for Underdog Fantasy. “It affected it really bad. I said it back then, where the most disappointing part of it all is I did 100 things right. I did one wrong thing and that’s all everyone remembers. That’s what really hurts you the most.”There have been other cautionary tales about star athletes and guns. Plaxico Burress accidentally shot himself in 2008 at a nightclub in Manhattan less than year after catching the game-winning touchdown for the Giants in the Super Bowl. He spent nearly two years in prison, and his career never recovered. In March, he was asked about Morant in an interview on “The Carton Show.”“If I was speaking to him, it would just be, ‘If you can’t learn anything, learn from me,’” Burress said. “Just make better decisions because you really don’t want for him to have that label moving forward, being that he’s so young. He has the opportunity to be the face of the N.B.A. He’s that great of a player and you want to continue to see him, you know, mature as a person as his game is getting better.”Morant, in his signature Nike sneakers, has been seen as one of the brightest young stars in the generation after LeBron James, left.Gary A. Vasquez/Usa Today Sports Via Reuters ConNegative reputations can be hard to shake, and the reactions to Morant’s behavior have been mixed. JJ Redick, the ESPN analyst and former N.B.A. player, has argued, like many others, that Morant shouldn’t face harsh punishment if he hasn’t broken the law. Charles Barkley, the TNT analyst and former N.B.A. player, has teed off on Morant, saying that the rules are different for public figures. Nike did not respond to a request for comment, but Morant’s shoes no longer come up in searches for his name at nike.com. A spokesperson for Powerade said the company had “no update” about Morant’s contract.Arenas lost his shoe deal with Adidas because of his gun incident. He also pleaded guilty to one count of felony gun possession and was sentenced to 30 days in a halfway house. That was more than a decade ago, but Arenas has become the go-to voice when athletes are in trouble. Still, in November, the Wizards honored him with a framed jersey at halftime of a game on “Throwback Night.”“We all throw out the word: ‘Be accountable for your actions,’” Arenas said. “But do we actually allow that person to really be accountable? When we see: ‘OK, he never touched a gun ever again. He’s never showed that same behavior to want to be around guns. Never looked at a gun.’ Why would you keep reminding the world that that’s what he did?“We want the person to change their behavior, but we don’t want to accept it when they do.” More

    • 150 Shares99 Views

      in Basket

      Brittney Griner Is Creating a New Normal, for Herself and the W.N.B.A.

      by

      PHOENIX — Brittney Griner embarked on a four-day itinerary that would disrupt anyone’s circadian rhythm.First came the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner in Washington, where she was decked out in a sharp, black suit that Saturday night. President Biden pointed to her in the audience and said, “Boy, I can hardly wait to see you back on the court.”Soon she was rushing to catch a flight, landing in Phoenix at 4 a.m. for the start of W.N.B.A. training camp with the Mercury. Then she hustled back east, to New York, for her first Met Gala. She wore a sleek tan suit, and her wife, Cherelle Griner, was in a strapless white gown, both custom outfits by Calvin Klein. They mingled with A-list celebrities that night, but Brittney needed to be back in Phoenix by Tuesday afternoon for more basketball and, she had hoped, a nap.The sparkling events, time-zone hopping and overall spectacle were overwhelming but perhaps also came as a kind of relief for Brittney Griner, who spent nearly 10 months detained in Russia and returned to the United States in December as a new symbol of hope. Ensnared in a geopolitical showdown between Washington and Moscow, Griner drew attention not only to herself and to the plight of other foreign detainees but also to the financial disparities facing women in sports that had brought her to Russia in the first place.On Friday, Griner will return to the court for her first official W.N.B.A. game in 579 days. The league is not the same now, in part because of her. The issues her detention spotlighted are not new and are unlikely to be easily resolved. But she has galvanized a potent fan base and sports work force who are both eager to welcome her home and to use this moment to promote change alongside her.“We have wanted change for a long time, but now we’re really starting to demand it,” Minnesota Lynx forward Napheesa Collier said. “We’re just getting a little more impatient with that and realizing that it’s an issue where we don’t have the money yet, but pushing so that really, really soon we do have the resources to be treated like the athletes we are.”A modest crowd roared for Griner this month during a preseason game, her first action since she was released from Russia.Christian Petersen/Getty ImagesWhy Brittney Griner Was in RussiaRussian customs officials detained Griner at an airport near Moscow in February 2022 after finding vape cartridges with hashish oil in her luggage as she returned to play for UMMC Yekaterinburg, a professional team that reportedly paid her at least $1 million. She was convicted on drug charges and sentenced to nine years in a penal colony, but she was freed in a prisoner swap for Viktor Bout, a Russian arms dealer, in December. The U.S. State Department said that she had been wrongfully detained.The W.N.B.A., now in its 27th season, has long watched dozens of its players go overseas during each off-season in search of higher pay, though the league has been trying to offer them additional ways to make money stateside. The maximum salary in the W.N.B.A. is about $230,000, and was half as much just a few years ago. Top players like Griner, a seven-time All-Star center, can command hundreds of thousands more from international teams. Many people were not aware of this dynamic until Griner’s detention and expressed shock and frustration on social media and on television shows.“As much as I would love to, you know, pay my light bill for the love of the game, I can’t,” Griner said last month during her first news conference since she was freed.The Associated Press reported that 67 of the league’s 144 players still played internationally this off-season, indicative of the strong pull of the opportunity to make additional income. But in light of Griner’s detention and the war in Ukraine, players eschewed the historically lucrative Russian organizations for teams in countries like Italy and Turkey. About 90 players played internationally five years ago.Collier, 26, who has played for international teams in W.N.B.A. off-seasons, said younger players gain important experience overseas. But she said she doubted she would play abroad again after Griner’s experience and because she wants to spend more time with her daughter, who will turn 1 next Thursday.“I also encourage everyone that played a part in bringing me home to continue their efforts to bring all Americans home,” Griner said in December.Caitlin O’Hara/Reuters‘That’s How You Build Household Names’W.N.B.A. officials have attributed players’ modest salaries to its historically modest — and perhaps meager — revenue and media attention. Many W.N.B.A. players have become accustomed to entering the league with less media fanfare and to at times playing before far smaller audiences than they experienced in college.“I’ve been a part of it when I was in college and it was the hottest ticket in the country,” said Mercury guard Diana Taurasi, who starred at UConn before becoming the W.N.B.A.’s career leading scorer. She continued: “How do we make the hottest ticket in the country for the best basketball players in the world in the W.N.B.A.? That, to me, it only happens in women’s sports where the adolescents get more attention than the grown-ups.”Griner, who joined the Mercury in 2013, has been a star since she became known for dunking at Baylor. At her first news conference since returning, Griner pleaded with the unusual swell of reporters to come and cover games during the season, too.“The league is a league that needs celebrity,” said Candy Lee, a professor of journalism and integrated marketing communications at Northwestern. She added: “The league can take advantage of it. The Mercury can take advantage of it.”The surge in W.N.B.A. interest because of Griner has dovetailed with broader momentum for women’s sports in recent years. The N.C.A.A. Division I women’s basketball championship game last month shattered records with an average of 9.9 million viewers, according to ESPN.A whirlwind few days for Griner included the White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner and the Met Gala, which she attended with her wife, Cherelle Griner.Jutharat Pinyodoonyachet for The New York TimesW.N.B.A. teams will play a record 40 regular-season games this year, and the league signed a multiyear deal with Scripps to televise Friday night games on the network ION. Griner’s first two regular-season games, on Friday in Los Angeles and Sunday in Phoenix against Chicago, will be nationally televised by ESPN. Viewership during the 2022 regular season rose 16 percent over the previous year, according to the league, making it the most-watched season in 14 years.Flip on the N.B.A. playoffs and you’re likely to spot a W.N.B.A. player, like Candace Parker of the Las Vegas Aces or Arike Ogunbowale of the Dallas Wings, featured prominently in a commercial. Puma recently announced the second signature shoe for the Liberty’s Breanna Stewart. Griner, who became the first openly gay athlete signed to Nike in 2014, remains with the brand, a spokesman confirmed, but the company did not answer questions about whether it planned to market her this season.A few weeks before Griner was detained, W.N.B.A. Commissioner Cathy Engelbert announced that the league had raised $75 million from investors that she planned to use for marketing and revamping the league’s business model.Collegiate stars like Angel Reese of Louisiana State, Paige Bueckers of UConn and Caitlin Clark of Iowa are poised to enter the league in the next few years, bringing their dynamic games, name recognition and national television exposure.“That’s why we’re putting so many marketing dollars behind some of our star players,” Engelbert said. She added: “That’s how you build household names.”Griner’s absence and images of her behind bars or in court weighed on her Phoenix teammates last year.Pool photo by Evgenia NovozheninaThe Travel DebateConcerns about Griner’s security while traveling since her detention have added to the fiery debate about travel in the W.N.B.A.Unlike in the N.B.A. or on many top men’s and women’s college teams, W.N.B.A. players fly on commercial airlines to games. It has long been a sore point for players, who have had to sleep in airports or rush to games because of delays. This year, it is widely believed that Griner will need to travel privately, though neither the Mercury nor the W.N.B.A. have disclosed her plans.“Would definitely like to make all those flights private,” Griner said. “That would be nice. Not just for me and my team, but for the whole league. We all deserve it. We work so hard. We do so much and it would be nice where we finally get to the point where we get to that point, too.”The W.N.B.A. has said that it cannot afford the tab of over $20 million a season for charter flights, even though some owners might be willing to provide them for their own teams. Charter flights are prohibited in the collective bargaining agreement between team owners and the players’ union as an unfair competitive advantage. The W.N.B.A. fined the Liberty $500,000 for secretly using charter flights to travel to some games during the 2021 season.In April, the league announced that it would have charter flights for teams playing on consecutive days during the regular season and for all playoff games. The W.N.B.A. had made exceptions in similar situations previously.“We’re going to chip away at this as we continue to build this model,” Engelbert said. “Because once you do it, you have to do it essentially for perpetuity, so we want to make sure we’re not putting the financial viability of the league at risk.”On Thursday, the W.N.B.A. players’ union announced a deal with Priority Pass to give players access to airport lounges, which could provide food, spa treatments and places to sleep. Nneka Ogwumike, the star Los Angeles forward who is president of the players’ union, said in a statement that she hoped other “partners” would see the deal as a “call to action.”In a statement, Terri Jackson, the union’s executive director, called the deal a “significant step in the right direction.”Players around the W.N.B.A. wrote to Griner and pushed for her release throughout 2022.Rebecca Noble for The New York Times‘She Impacts the World’Vince Kozar, the president of the Mercury, described an ominous cloud over the franchise last season at every practice, media session and game without Griner. Brief video clips that emerged of her in Russia showed her handcuffed or caged. The day Griner was sentenced, Mercury players came together and cried — then had to play a game. “You carried that weight of the uncertainty and the fear,” Kozar said.It finally, suddenly, parted upon Griner’s release in December. Kozar did not expect Griner to announce immediately whether she would again play in the W.N.B.A. But when she returned to the United States, she said she would play.Griner may have been the most plugged-in W.N.B.A. player last season. Players from around the league sent her letters, their only means of communicating with her. In letters with Kozar, Griner was not asking about the organization and its going-ons as much as informing him about them.“It was just a reminder that basketball was one of the things that had been taken away from her, this thing how she impacts the world that’s central to her identity, that so many of her relationships are built around,” Kozar said.Griner will lead the league in hugs this season. She scribbled autographs and posed for selfies in the tunnel of a preseason game against the Sparks in Phoenix last week. It was her first action since she’d returned. A modest crowd cheered louder than it seemed capable of during Griner’s pregame introduction. Mercury Coach Vanessa Nygaard said chills ran down her spine.Griner towered over everyone else on the court, securing her first bucket on a quick turnaround a minute into the first quarter. All right, here we go, Griner thought to herself. So much had seemed unfamiliar to her lately. Jet-setting for a living? That’s not her, she said with a laugh. But that first shot, she thought, that felt comfortable.Matt York/Associated Press More

    • 100 Shares179 Views

      in Basket

      What to Know About the 2023 WNBA Season

      by

      New superteams, new rules and Brittney Griner’s return are reshaping the league as star rookies try to make their mark.The W.N.B.A. begins its 27th season on Friday with new rules, new rosters and one big return. Here’s what to expect.Brittney Griner is back.After nearly 10 months in detention in Russia, Brittney Griner is playing basketball again.Griner’s detention clouded the W.N.B.A. season last year. She was arrested at an airport near Moscow on drug charges in February 2022, and subsequently convicted and sentenced to nine years in a penal colony. The league regularly paid tribute to her during the season, and her fellow players spoke out on her behalf.Brittney Griner is back with the Phoenix Mercury on a one-year contract after missing the 2022 season while she was detained in Russia.Matt York/Associated PressGriner was released in a prisoner swap in December, and after time spent recovering privately, she signed a one-year contract to return to the Phoenix Mercury.Griner played no basketball during her imprisonment and is still working to get back into game shape. “Everybody tells me to give myself grace and that it’s going to take time,” she said at a news conference in April, “but that’s the hardest thing to do for a pro athlete because we always want to be right back at our top shape.”Griner and the Mercury open their season on Friday in Los Angeles against the Sparks.Star players are joining forces.The off-season was dominated by free-agent signings and trades that established what could be two superteams: the Liberty and the Las Vegas Aces.The Liberty made three key moves: First, they traded with the Connecticut Sun for Jonquel Jones, the league’s most valuable player in 2021. Then they landed one of the top free agents: Breanna Stewart, the 2018 M.V.P., who had won two championships in Seattle. Finally, they signed the league’s active assists leader, Courtney Vandersloot. Those three join the returnees Betnijah Laney and Sabrina Ionescu, who have each made an All-Star team.Breanna Stewart was one of the top free agents. She had been with the Seattle Storm since she was drafted No. 1 overall in 2016.Ethan Miller/Getty ImagesThe reigning champion Aces already featured an impressive collection of talent: last year’s M.V.P., A’ja Wilson (who also won in 2020); Chelsea Gray, the 2022 finals M.V.P.; and their fellow All-Stars, Jackie Young and Kelsey Plum. And then they went and signed Candace Parker, the two-time M.V.P., two-time champion and seven-time All-Star. They also picked up the veteran Alysha Clark, who won two titles with Seattle.The rest of the league isn’t backing down from the superteams. “In the best movies, the underdog ends up on top,” Elena Delle Donne of the Washington Mystics told reporters this month.But still, the Aces and Liberty are far and away the betting favorites to win it all.Rookies look to make their mark.Some of the newest W.N.B.A. players are just weeks removed from finishing their college careers. How they make that transition will be crucial to the fortunes of their new teams.Aliyah Boston was the obvious choice of the Indiana Fever as the No. 1 overall pick in the April draft. Boston, who led South Carolina to a national title in 2022 and back to the Final Four this year, is expected to be a franchise cornerstone for the Fever as they rebuild. Though the competition she faces will be tougher in the W.N.B.A., Boston should be able to score more easily without facing the same double and triple teams she saw in college.With this year’s No. 2 pick, Minnesota drafted Diamond Miller, who led Maryland with nearly 20 points a game in the 2022-23 season. Miller is a versatile and athletic wing who should pair well with Napheesa Collier.Haley Jones, the No. 6 pick in the draft, was a leader for four years at Stanford, including the Cardinals’ 2021 title run. She slots in well on an Atlanta Dream team looking for more playmakers.New rules will add new wrinkles.The league also updated its rule book this off-season.W.N.B.A. coaches will now be able to challenge one — and only one — call per game. Coaches can ask for reviews on three kinds of calls: a foul called on their team, an out-of-bounds call, or a violation for goaltending or basket interference. Coaches will be limited to one challenge even if the challenge is successful, and even if the game goes to overtime.W.N.B.A. coaches, like Seattle’s Noelle Quinn, will have one challenge per game this season as part of series of rule changes.Steph Chambers/Getty ImagesOfficials may also now penalize players for committing a foul during a fast break without making a legitimate play on the ball. For this, a transition take foul, the offensive team will be awarded one free throw, which can be taken by any player on the floor, and the offensive team will keep control of the ball.The W.N.B.A. also has new guidelines governing sideline behavior. In an effort to limit disruptions and distractions, the league is telling players who are not in the game that they may not stand “for a prolonged period.” Players and coaches are also prohibited from “attempting to distract their opponents in an unsportsmanlike manner.” Teams could receive a delay-of-game warning or a technical foul for a violation. More

    • 113 Shares179 Views

      in Basket

      The Miami Heat’s Undrafted Players Are Their Secret Weapon

      by

      The Miami Heat have nine undrafted players — more than any other N.B.A. team. “When you’re in that position,” one player said, “you’re willing to do anything.”BOSTON — Max Strus had spent two seasons punishing defenders as a shooting guard at Lewis University, a Division II school in Romeoville, Ill., before he delivered some news to his coach that was not entirely unexpected: He wanted to transfer to a major Division I program.For the coach, Scott Trost, it was bittersweet. He was sad to see Strus go, but he also knew that Strus was ready for his next challenge.“And who’s to say if he would be where he is today if he didn’t make that move?” Trost said.On Wednesday night, seven years after he transferred to DePaul and nearly four years after he matriculated to the N.B.A. G League as an undrafted free agent, Strus was sinking 3-pointers and making defensive stops for the Miami Heat in their 123-116 victory over the Celtics in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals.But perhaps the oddest part about his unlikely presence was that it was not odd at all — at least not for the Heat, who have a league-high nine undrafted players on their 17-man roster. On Wednesday, three of those players — Strus, Gabe Vincent and Caleb Martin — scored 15 points each while combining to shoot 16 of 27 from the field.“I think it’s something unique that we’ve all gone through,” said Vincent, the team’s starting point guard, “and we know how difficult it can be. So we just try to motivate each other and keep each other going.”Miami Heat guard Max Strus, left, has gone from a two-way player to one of the Heat’s best 3-point shooters.Charles Krupa/Associated PressThe conference finals have coincided with pre-draft buzz of the highest (and tallest) order. On Tuesday, as N.B.A. hopefuls began to cycle through Chicago for the league’s scouting combine, the San Antonio Spurs landed the No. 1 pick in the draft, set for June 22 at Barclays Center.Barring a cosmic catastrophe, the Spurs will select Victor Wembanyama, a 7-foot-4 teenager from France and the most celebrated prospect since LeBron James. A gifted player who has size and skill, along with an innate feel for the game — yes, he really did tip-dunk his own 3-point miss earlier this season — Wembanyama could be a transformational force for the Spurs.But beyond Wembanyama and the rest of this year’s picks, teams have another roster-building option at their disposal: plumbing the pool of the undrafted, a strategy that has proved increasingly viable as basketball continues to expand its global reach and more talent rises to the surface.“When you’re in that position, you’re willing to do anything,” said Martin, who was an all-conference player at Nevada but went undrafted in 2019. “And I think more teams are starting to appreciate that.”Consider that 126 undrafted players, representing about a quarter of the league, found their way onto N.B.A. rosters this season. But no team leaned on the overshadowed, the snubbed and the slighted more than the Heat did, with undrafted players scoring a league-high 33.8 percent of the team’s points during the regular season, according to N.B.A. Advanced Stats. The Nets ranked second in that category, with undrafted players accounting for 24 percent of the team’s points.Heat Coach Erik Spoelstra noted that two of his best players — Bam Adebayo and Tyler Herro, who has been sidelined with a broken hand since the first round — were high first-round picks. Forward Jimmy Butler, who was brilliant on Wednesday, collecting 35 points, 7 assists and 6 steals, joined the team in a sign-and-trade with the Philadelphia 76ers in 2019. But he was a late first-round pick, by Chicago, in 2011. In other words, the Heat like name-brand stars, too.Some teams, like Oklahoma City and San Antonio, have stockpiled draft picks through trades, but the Heat have not. Instead, Spoelstra said, the team has needed to be creative about how to fill out its roster. Many of Miami’s undrafted players have come up through its G League affiliate, the Sioux Falls Skyforce. Spoelstra said players in the G League or from overseas are often just as talented as some N.B.A. reserves.“It’s all about timing and fit, and what a player’s fortitude is,” he said, adding: “If you have a big dream and want to be challenged, we feel like this can be the place for a lot of those kinds of guys.”Miami Heat forward Udonis Haslem, center, rarely plays now, in his 20th season, but he unleashed a vintage performance on April 9 with 24 points. He’s retiring after the playoffs.Lynne Sladky/Associated PressAnd if Spoelstra needs any help gauging (or enhancing) that fortitude, he can turn to Udonis Haslem, a power forward who went undrafted in 2002, spent his first professional season in France and joined the Heat the following year. Now 42, Haslem has been with Miami ever since.“I think organizations are doing a better job of doing their homework and not just assuming, because a guy didn’t get drafted, that he can’t help you win,” Haslem said. “You can’t measure character or discipline or accountability at the draft combine, and a lot of those things sometimes get overlooked.”Haslem has played sparingly in recent seasons, but he has outsize influence in the locker room, including as the self-appointed dean of the undrafted. Those who are new to the team get a one-on-one conversation with Haslem, who tells them about his three championship rings and about how anything is possible. But they had better be prepared to work, because Haslem will be watching.“I take it personally when an undrafted guy comes here,” he said. “I want them to be successful because I feel like that’s a piece of my legacy.”His legacy now includes the likes of Vincent, who tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee as a junior at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He was early in his rehab when Joe Pasternack was hired as the team’s new coach.“The first call I got,” Pasternack said, “was from Gabe Vincent saying: ‘Coach, tell me what you need me to do. Do you need me to call the players? Set up a team meeting?’ That left an impression.”Vincent was back in uniform for the start of his senior season. But after averaging just 12.4 points a game, he landed in the G League with the Stockton Kings. A few weeks into Vincent’s first season there, Pasternack had an opening for a full-time assistant and offered him the job. Pasternack believed in Vincent as a player, but he also knew he was grinding away without any guarantees.Miami Heat guard Gabe Vincent hurt his knee in college and went undrafted.Bob Dechiara/USA Today Sports Via Reuters Con“I just saw so many kids in the G League not going anywhere,” Pasternack said. “But I also thought he was such an unbelievable leader that he’d be a great assistant coach.”Vincent politely declined the offer.“I was sort of like ‘Joe, what are you talking about?’” Vincent recalled, laughing. “I don’t know why he keeps telling that story, and I’ve told him that: ‘Joe, this does not make you look good!’”Vincent signed a two-way deal with the Heat during the 2019-20 season and slowly began to work his way into the rotation. He averaged a career-high 9.4 points a game this season. He is due for a significant payday this summer as an unrestricted free agent.Strus thought he could someday make a living playing basketball in Europe. That was the goal when he was at Lewis University. It was not until his second day on campus after transferring to DePaul that his mind-set changed. Dave Leitao, who was then the team’s coach, told him that he could have a future in the N.B.A.“It was huge,” Strus said. “I’d never been told that in my life.”As a first-year pro during the 2019-20 season, Strus was cut by the Celtics and then tore his left A.C.L. in a game with the G League’s Windy City Bulls. He signed a two-way deal with the Heat the following season. On Wednesday, he grabbed the game’s final rebound.“I’ve taken advantage of every opportunity they’ve given me here,” he said. More