Another year, another new team to coach for Larry Brown.

On Tuesday, Brown was introduced as the Charlotte Bobcats’ new head coach, the ninth NBA team he will lead. The Hall of Famer will look to improve on his last go-around in the league, a horrendous 23-59 season with the New York Knicks two years ago. Thankfully, this time should be different.

Michael Jordan, the Bobcats’ Managing Member of Basketball Operations and a part-owner of the team, was the man that hired Brown. When Jordan was in the Washington Wizards’ front office, he tried to hire Brown to the same position but failed to do so. After a year as an executive vice president in the Philadelphia 76ers’ organization, Brown accepted Jordan’s second offer to coach his team. Read more »

The Dallas Mavericks and Phoenix Suns knew that adjustments had to be made if they were to make a run at an NBA championship. Neither of their longshot trade experiments - the Mavs’ with Jason Kidd and the Suns’ with Shaquille O’Neal - panned out, as the Mavs were eliminated by the New Orleans Hornets and the Suns by the San Antonio Spurs on Tuesday night.

Forcing the action on the trade market, which the crowded Western Conference forced these two teams to do in February, is rarely a good move. It’s easy to say in retrospect that these were foolish deals to make, but they were foolish far before the two teams were bounced from the playoffs. Read more »

There are lessons to be learned from this postseason, where the Denver Nuggets and Toronto Raptors were the first teams sent packing on Monday night. Individual players like Kobe Bryant and Dwight Howard are putting a stamp on their team’s success better than they have at any points in their careers.

Homecourt has again been a storyline, but for different reasons in each series. It has been cause for huge momentum swings in the Boston-Atlanta, Washington-Cleveland and Phoenix-San Antonio series, but been stripped away by the Lakers, Magic and Hornets. Read more »

One of the things we have learned from the NBA playoffs is that solid point guard play is vital for success. A point guard does not have to do anything special for his team to win, just manage the game. However, there are some point guards who are capable of taking over a game. Two players in particular have been doing it for years, but now it appears that two young guns are primed to take their spots as the elite NBA point guards. Read more »

There was a time when walking into Madison Square Garden for a Knicks game felt like legitimate basketball, and not the Barnum and Bailey circus that comes to the Garden in the offseason.

Between Isiah Thomas and Stephon Marbury alone – dare I call them the Ringling Bros. – the team has become the laughing stock of the league. The season started with an embarrassing sexual harassment trial where the team’s head coach and president was the defendant, and with a series of bizarre (to be polite) interviews from Marbury. Read more »

With two games in the books, the first round of the NBA playoffs has been dominated by chalk. In seven of the eight series, the higher seed has jumped out to a 2-0 lead. However, as the old adage goes, “the lower seed is never finished until they lose on their home court.” We’ll see what happens as the games switch venues, but in the meantime, here’s a recap of the last two nights’ games.

TUESDAY

New Orleans Hornets 127, Dallas Mavericks 103; New Orleans lead series 2-0.
Chris Paul showed why he should be the league’s MVP this season, scoring 32 points and dishing out 17 assists in the convincing win. Paul was constantly doubled, but it didn’t seem to matter as the Mavericks had no answer for the speedy guard. David West scored 27 points and Peja Stojakovic added 22 for the Hornets, who shot 61 percent as a team from the field. Dirk Nowitzki led Dallas with 27 points but received little help outside of Brandon Bass.

San Antonio Spurs 102, Phoenix Suns 96; San Antonio lead series 2-0.
For the second straight game, the Suns jumped out to a solid halftime lead only to let it slip away in the second half. Amare Stoudemire and Shaquille O’Neal dominated the paint in the first half, but ultimately, the Suns had no answer for Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili, who penetrated into the lane and scored at will. Parker finished with 32 points and Ginobili had 29 for the Spurs, while Stoudemire led the Suns with 33 points.

Orlando Magic 104, Toronto Raptors 103; Magic lead series 2-0.
Orlando escaped with the one-point victory thanks to another dominating performance by Dwight Howard. Just like game one, Howard recorded a 20-point, 20-rebound game to help the Magic maintain home-court advantage. Toronto’s Chris Bosh, who led the team with 29 points and 10 rebounds, had a 16-footer at the buzzer to win the game, but it clanked off the front of the rim. Jameer Nelson and Rashard Lewis each scored 18 for the Magic.

WEDNESDAY

Los Angeles Lakers 122, Denver Nuggets 107; Lakers lead series 2-0.
Kobe Bryant didn’t have to carry the load in game one thanks to Pau Gasol’s 36-point, 16-rebound effort, but in game two, Bryant returned to his usual role, exploding for 49 points and 10 assists. The Nuggets had no answer for the superstar, a discouraging, season-long theme for the team. Allen Iverson led the Nuggets with 31 points, and Marcus Camby grabbed 17 rebounds and blocked four shots, but unless Denver figures out how to play team defense, this series is over.

Boston Celtics 96, Atlanta Hawks 77; Celtics lead series 2-0.
With five guys in double figures, the Celtics used a balanced attack to slowly devastate the Hawks by 19 points. Kevin Garnett, who received the NBA Defensive Player of the Year award before the game, led Boston with 19 points and 10 rebounds. Atlanta also put five guys in double figures, but none scored more than 13 points. Mike Bibby, who criticized Boston fans before the game for being fair-weather fans, scored 12 points but dished out only one assist.

Detroit Pistons 105, Philadelphia 76ers 88; series tied 1-1.
Fueled by a surprising loss in game one, the Pistons came out on a mission in game two. Four Detroit players, led by Richard Hamilton’s 20, scored at least 16 points in the must-win game. Louis Williams led the 76ers with 17 points and Andre Miller added 14, but the game was never really in doubt for Detroit. The Pistons jumped all over Philadelphia in the first-half on their way to a 17-point lead at the break. 

It’s never too early to start thinking about next year.

If your fantasy season didn’t go as well as planned, or if you’ll be trying to defend a title, you’ll want to read this list of sleepers for the 2008-09 season. These are guys who will be undervalued and I think will blossom into legitimate fantasy producers. Sure, free agency and the June draft can change a lot of things, but here is your first sneak peek at the 12 best sleepers for next season. Read more »

Washington Wizards guard Gilbert Arenas, self-proclaimed Agent Zero, has found two more futile operatives in the Wizards organization. Joining him are Agent 9, Antawn Jamison, and Agent 12, Caron Butler. The numbers represent each player’s point totals in Washington’s 116-86 blowout loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers last night. Arenas was no star, either, going 2-for-10 from the floor and scoring seven points.
 
LeBron James needed no extra motivation, but got it from Arenas, who called the Cavs “beatable” and DeShawn Stevenson, who called James “overrated.” He outscored the Wizards’ star trio 30-28 on his own on Monday night and lifted the Cavs to a commanding 2-0 series lead. Read more »

13-34.

That was the Memphis Grizzlies’ record with Pau Gasol this season. And following a 22-60 record a year ago, it was becoming painfully obvious that the Grizzlies needed to start over. Many Memphis fans wanted management to keep the former All-Star and build around him, but the team had other plans.

On February 1, the Grizzlies pulled off a stunning trade with the Los Angeles Lakers, sending Gasol to L.A. for Kwame Brown, Javaris Crittenton and two first-round draft picks. On paper, the trade looked incredibly lopsided, and that has proved to be the case. The Grizzlies finished the season with nine wins in their last 35 games, while the Lakers flourished and earned the top seed in the Western Conference playoffs. Read more »

With the NBA playoff picture now set, there is plenty of speculating to be done. In the Eastern Conference, can anyone topple the Boston Celtics? Meanwhile, out in the Western Conference, which team will survive the brutality and make it to the NBA Finals? Read more »