New York Sports Fan Blog

The New York Knicks sadly lost the first game of the second series. Needless to say the Knicks needed to win game 2 against the Indiana Pacers. The Knicks played well making the shots and clinching the lead when they needed to. The Knicks came to play, Carmelo Anthony drained an outstanding 32 points, which he should be doing every game of the playoffs. Iman Shumpert had an outstanding game as well with 15 points. This man loves to ball out and make plays. As a knicks fan i really love having Shumpert he can play from anywhere on the court, and in game 2 of the series he made some outstanding plays. Raymond Felton as always puts up the points he supposed to be, he ended the game with 14 points.

The Knicks began the third trailing the Pacers 64-62. That’s when the knicks began to play some ball, they went on a 30-2 run bridging the third and fourth periods. This run that the knicks had put them ahead 92-66, exactly what we needed. This demoralized the Pacers, they had no chance of coming back. The Knicks had all the momentum and kept it. The final score of the game was 105-79 in Madison Square Garden (MSG).

Game three will be held in Indiana with Amare Stoudemire being back.

I don’t understand how the knicks would let the Celtics come back in the series. we could have just finshed them last night and move on to the next round. But no J.R. Smith had to decide to not show up, and didnt make a field point until the fourth with a three pointer. Carmelo Anthony and J.R. Smith combined hit 11-38 shots last night. That is completely unacceptable by both players. Carmelo finished with 22 pts and 8-24 shooting with suffering a shoulder injury in the fourth because of Kevin Garnetts physical play.. J.R. Smith had 14 points and was 3-14.They need to come and show up for every game, this is the playoffs, they need to get there act together. To make matters worse the Celtics had five players who scored double digits last night. Almost forgot to add that Felton had 21 points last night.

Due to the loss in MSG now the Knicks have to go back to TD Garden in Boston. Hopefully going into game 6 sunday night i hope the knicks come ready to play.

As part of the All Star Weekend, the annual Slam Dunk event will occur in mid-February. Participants are given the opportunity to make three dunks. Following the contest, voting is opened up to fans to select the player with the best dunks. Despite big names in basketball shunning the event, it still continues to have a lot of entertainment value for basketball fans. Last year’s event was won by Jeremy Evans of the Jazz who dunked two balls simultaneously in a spectacular fashion. This will be one of several events during basketball’s weekend of the year that will be the focus of sports betting at online casinos.
Some betting options on the Slam Dunk Event of course will pertain to which player will win the bet. Voting can often be rather close which affects the odds established by the online casino site. Proposition sports bets are rather popular for this upcoming basketball event. These are types of sports bet that focus on specific player performance rather than teams winning a game. Bets on this event can be placed up to minutes before it occurs.
When All Star Weekend occurs, there is bound to be idle time between basketball events such as the Slam Dunk Contest. An idea for filling this time includes playing basketball themed slot machines at online casinos like http://www.ipadcasino.ca/. One of the most well known basketball related slot machines is Slam Dunk. All of the symbols found on the reels are different types of basketball memorabilia. For instance, a jersey emblazoned with the number 23 is found on the reels. While it omits a name, it is paying tribute to Michael Jordan, one of the best players in NBA history. This number 23 jersey serves as the wild symbol in the game. It can be used to substitute for any other symbol excluding the scatter symbol.

While most NBA teams acquire their talent through free agency and trades, the Oklahoma City Thunder took a different approach and it has paid off handsomely for them. The Thunder have built there team almost exclusively through the draft. Their best player on their current team acquired through free agency or trade is either Thabo Sefolosha or Kendrick Perkins who combined to average 10.4 points per game this season.

Their drafting expertise started in 2007 when they drafted the now three time defending scoring champion Kevin Durant 2nd overall. It continued in 2008 when they drafted Russell Westbrook 4th overall despite Westbrook averaging just 12.7 points and 4.3 assists the year before at UCLA. They also used the 24th pick to draft Serge Ibaka from the Republic of Congo. Ibaka had only started playing basketball recently and didn’t speak a word of English. In 2009, they would use the 4th overall pick to select James Harden. These players are now the four leading scorers on the team.

No team’s perfect though, the Thunder have made a few mistakes in the draft. The only mistakes I could find was: 1. In the 2009 draft they traded the draft rights of Rodrigue Beaubois to Dallas for the draft rights to Byron Mullens; 2. In 2010 they traded the rights to Eric Bledsoe to the Clippers for a future protected first round pick (not exactly a mistake yet, but Bledsoe’s been a nice player.); 3. You could argue drafting Cole Aldrich 11th in the 2010 draft was a bad move, but really there wasn’t much after him: There was Avery Bradley who went 19th and would have been a solid bench player for them, Landry Fields who went 39th and really just would have been a younger version of Sefolosha and Lance Stephenson who went 40th and could have made choking signs at Lebron in the Finals.

These mistakes are all minuet though and because of the Thunder’s impeccable drafting abilities they look to possibly have a potential dynasty. There only challenge will be keeping all their drafted players.

Watching the Oklahoma City Thunder and the San Antonio Spurs series is like comparing night and day. The Thunder on one hand, are young, exciting and fun to watch. On the other hand, the Spurs are full of veterans, they are slow and just plain boring. If the Spurs were playing any other team in the NBA besides the Thunder, the Miami Heat or the New York Knicks, I would rather watch the grass grow or wet paint dry on a wall then sit back and watch another Tim Duncan bank shot or Manu Ginobili flop. The only player that I can generously say is …somewhat… interesting is Tony Parker. Besides him, the Spurs do not bring a lot to the table in terms of excitement. That being said, there is no denying the fact that the Spurs are a winning organization. They play excellent team basketball and have great chemistry on the court together. I just wish every now and then that I can say to myself, “I want to watch the Spurs play tonight”. Hopefully within the next few years when the old men retire and a new generation of Spurs come up, they are more interesting to watch then the Spurs are now.

With the 2011 NBA Draft only three weeks away (June 23rd in Newark, NJ), New York Knicks management is hard at work conducting individual workouts and weighing their options as to who they will select with the 17th overall pick. The Knicks needs as draft day approaches are very clear: size, size, and more size. It is well known that Amare Stoudemire is most effective when playing the power-forward position, and he has repeatedly expressed a desire to play alongside a true big-man in order to keep him out of foul trouble and allow him roam around defensively and help from the weak side.

Unfortunately, the Knicks have little to no cap space to put towards a center this summer, as the top young centers on the market — the best probably being the Sacramento King’s Samuel Dalembert — will be looking for big money and long-term contracts. The other piece of bad news is that this year’s draft is somewhat thin on centers (aren’t they all). 6-11 Turkish center Enes Kanter and 6-11 Lithuanian big-man Jonas Valanciunas have gotten great reviews from team owners and draft experts, but it will be almost impossible for the Knicks to make a pass at either of them, as they are both predicted to be picked in the top 8. What will most likely have to happen if the Knicks do in fact draft with the goal of improving their size and length (it is always a possibility that they go with a guard, possibly Kansas’ Josh Selby — scratch that, when you’re talking about the Knicks, anything is a possibility), is that the team will select the best 6-9 to 6-10 player available when the 17th pick rolls around (Klay Thompson, Marcus Morris, Kenneth Faried, Jordan Hamilton) and hope Ronny Turiaf can provide enough minutes to keep Stoudemire at the 4 for the majority of games. So in the end, and as much as it hurts me to say this, how well the Knicks do next year will in large part (too large) be determined by the play of Ronny Turiaf, or whoever New York decides to start at center alongside Amare.

Now for some good news — the first piece being that I am almost positive that Knicks fans will not allow for Jared Jeffries to ever step on a basketball court wearing a Knicks jersey ever again. Don’t get me wrong, Ronny Turiaf is no Dwight Howard, but he’s also no Jared Jeffries, which means he’s not one of the top-5 worst players to ever play in the NBA. The other good news is that the 17th pick in the NBA Draft has produced some fine players in the recent past, which, although it doesn’t really mean anything substantial, can’t be a bad thing. Right? Well here are a few of them anyway. Call it wishful thinking…

2009. Jrue Holliday (UCLA) – Philadelphia 76ers
2008. Roy Hibbert (Georgetown) – Toronto Raptors (Traded to Indiana)
2006. Shawne Williams (Memphis) – Indiana Pacers
2005. Danny Granger (New Mexico) – Indiana Pacers
2004. Josh Smith (Oak Hill Academy, VA) – Atlanta Hawks
2000.Desmond Mason (Oklahoma State) – Seattle SuperSonics
1996. Jermaine O’Neal (Eau Claire HS) – Portland Trail Blazers
1992. Doug Christie (Pepperdine) – Seattle SuperSonics
1989. Shawn Kemp (Trinity Valley CC) – Seattle SuperSonics

Quietly the New Jersey Nets have set themselves up for better long-term success then their cross-river counterparts! After being used as the third wheel in many trade speculations over the past 18 months the Nets and new owner Mikhail Prokhorov have finally landed a prize player. With the addition of Deron Williams in a trade earlier today the Nets have what they hope will be the key piece in there promise to the fans to be a championship team within five years. Williams is a proven point guard that you can build a team around.

The Carmello Anthony trade may overshadow this trade, but it shouldn’t. The Nets are now set up much better for the future then the Knicks are. The Nets now have a base on which to build around. They have a proven all-star point guard and a solid future all-star center in Brooks Lopez. Although the Nets took a gamble to bring in Williams who will be a free agent in 2012 they didn’t give up much to get him.

So while the Knicks emptied their cupboard to get Carmello and leave little left to work with, the Nets began their quest to Brooklyn with pieces intact. Now all the Nets and Prokhorov have to do is continue building pieces so when they do make the move Williams will be the guy leading the charge.

Once again Jim Dolan has dragged his famed New York Knicks into the doldrums of oblivion. On the surface all is great with Knicks, not only did they land their superstar that will put them on the basketball map for the first time in 15 years, they truly believe they are contenders again in a top heavy Eastern Conference. However the surface is a thin sheet of hardwood, a sheet that will collapse under the increased pressure to win now that Carmello Anthony is in town. The Knicks sold their entire core to the devil and I don’t believe they made a good deal.

The reason the Knicks were in the position they were in has nothing to do with Carmello, or the players or proven GM Donnie Walsh. The reason the Knicks have been floating around in oblivion for so long is because of Dolan! He spent the post Patrick Ewing years trading and selling draft picks for has-beens that ate up salary cap and spent more time on the injury list then on the court. It wasn’t until Walsh showed up did the Knicks become somewhat relevant again, he got rid of the dead weight, he made smart business moves and good draft choice’s he brought excitement back to Madison Square Garden. Then Dolan erased Walsh’s Knicks legacy in a matter of seconds, he took the core and traded it to Denver for Anthony, the same Anthony that refused to sign an extension with the Nuggets, the same Anthony that was never going to accept a trade to the New Jersey Nets, the same Anthony that was going to become a free-agent in June and would hit the open market for the same $65 million dollars the Knicks will be paying him.

Dolan took the Knicks from a 7th seed in the East to a 6th seed in East and traded everything he had to get there. Lets face the facts; the Knicks now have no youth, no draft picks and no way of building around Carmello and Amare Stoudemire. They aren’t going to win a NBA championship as long as the big three are in Boston, Lebron James and Dwayne Wade are in Miami and Kobe Bryant is in the league.
So I ask you Knicks fans, you got Carmello, but was it worth it?

New Jersey Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov said Wednesday he will retain team president Rod Thorn, but will not ask general manager Kiki Vandeweghe to return when his contract expires this summer, according to multiple media reports.

“His agreement expires this summer and I wish him well,” Prokhorov told reporters.

Vandeweghe, reached for comment on a plane as he was about to embark on a scouting trip, said “I hadn’t heard anything.” He declined additional comment, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Vandeweghe also coached the Nets this season, taking over after Lawrence Frank was fired following an 0-16 start. The team went 12-52 with Vandeweghe as coach.

Click here to read the full article – By of ESPNNewYork.com

The last holdout in a long-running land dispute with the developer of an NBA arena agreed Wednesday to sell his home on the site for $2.4 million more than he paid for it a few years ago.

Daniel Goldstein and his family agreed to leave their Brooklyn condo by May 7 in a settlement in court with developer Forest City Ratner Cos.

Goldstein said he bought the condo for $590,000 in 2003 and will receive $3 million for it. The sale figure was first reported in The New York Times.

Goldstein founded Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn, the Atlantic Yards development project’s most vocal critic. Under the terms of the settlement, he can no longer be the spokesman for the group, but he said he will still be involved with it.

Click here to read the full article – By Associated Press of ESPNNewyork.com