Good morning. I don’t know what the headline means either. PLAYOFFS. Let’s basketball.
Good morning. J.R. Smith burst all of Atlanta’s pipes.
That and more in Thursday’s NBA newsletter.
J-DAY: J.R. Smith dropped eight threes on the Hawks as the Cavaliers took a 1-0 lead. Atlanta was actually in it until the end, but Cleveland’s defense gave the Hawks all sorts of problems. Al Horford wasn’t himself, Kyle Korver couldn’t lose Iman Shumpert and, as Paul Flannery writes, LeBron James took over at all the right moments.
BAD NEWS: DeMarre Carroll, one of the best stories of the season, suffered a serious knee injury. An MRI will reveal the extent. The Hawks are initially calling it a knee sprain; it might be a torn ACL. Which would be awful, awful, awful.
THIS IS THE RIGHT DEFENSIVE PLAY: Watch Korver decide he wants absolutely no part of a LeBron dunk. Good call, Kyle.
THAT SAID: Kent Bazemore had THE dunk of the game. Marv Albert was born to call dunks like that.
COURTSIDE FASHION: Former Hawks CEO 2 Chainz wore a bandanna poncho to the game. It’s kind of a cultural problem that we don’t have an L.A. team or Miami in the final four, isn’t it?
THE LONG ROAD BACK: Rodger Sherman on Shaun Livingston.
REALLY? When I first saw the quotes from some respected basketball writers that kids should be banned from the podium after Stephen Curry’s adorable daughter provided a bunch of people with joy and laughter ruined everything, I thought it was all tongue in cheek. Some of these sportswriters are serious! Like, they are complaining that tiny children are preventing them from doing their jobs. I like Seth Rosenthal’s first suggestion: use those hardcore reporting chops to ask tough questions anyway. Or, you know, relax a little. Matt Ufford has one more alternative: shut up, appreciate how great your job is and do it.
SWIN CASH ON ISIAH THOMAS: Cash’s opinion on the matter a great deal as she’s the star of the New York Liberty, the WNBA team for which he’s been tentatively given an equity stake, and she’s also the VP of the WNBA players’ union.
BUYING SWISH: Excellent piece by Brian Windhorst on two conversations that convinced the Cavaliers to grab J.R. Smith in a trade.
DAYS OF FUTURE PAST: I wrote about how Rockets vs. Warriors is the future of basketball.
POSTER CHILD: Jonathan Abrams on Timofey Mozgov’s NBA identity.
THE OPPOSITE OF KOBE: Sean Deveney says getting the No. 2 pick will help the Lakers win over free agents.
IS THERE ANYTHING HE CAN’T DO? Jamie Foxx’s Doc Rivers impersonation is spot on.
BEHIND THE SCENES: Zach Lowe from the secret drawing room at the NBA Draft Lottery.
ALL-DEFENSIVE TEAMS! Rudy Gobert didn’t a spot. But Tony Allen did, in fact, win a spot on the first team. HE KNEW.
WELL THAT’S INTERESTING: Curry fined for a late flop. And here we thought James Harden was the only superstar who flopped? Huh!
AIRHORN: Karl-Anthony Towns scouting report from Kevin O’Connor! It appears the Wolves are indeed torn between Towns and Jahlil Okafor.
ERNIE FOREVER: Excellent E:60 piece on the great Ernie Johnson.
Happy Thursday. See you next time.
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