NBA Discussion

Things will be interesting for a while with what the Heat plans to try and do

There's an article here about the Heat meeting with Fisher. Miami have got just four players under contract, so they'll need to sign more.

The Suns have signed Turkoglu & Childress

Never heard of either of the guys the Suns got but then again I don't really follow basketball or any sport for that matter so that doesn't mean much.

As I said things are going to be interesting to see what happens and if the Lakers can keep their dynasty going

Turkoglu was great in the playoffs a few years ago when he was with the Magic so that should be a good addition.

Well according to Fisher's twitter he is stayin LA

I thought Fisher would stay with the Lakers. Farmar's left the Lakers though to join the Nets. Al Jefferson might be going to the Jazz as Boozer & Korver have gone to the Bulls. Haslem's staying with the Heat.

I think the main reason Fisher stayed in LA was because Kobe supposedly asked him too, even though Kobe supposedly also said he would support Fisher no matter what he decided to do but I think Fisher respects Kobe so

Yep, I've read Kobe and Derek Fisher are good friends, which most likely played a big part in Fisher staying with LA. Also, the Heat have another new player - Zydrunas Ilgauskas from the Cavs. It mentions in the article here that the veteran minimum is$1.3 million, so I'm guessing Miami can bring in the necessary players to fill out their roster just signing veterans to minimum deals like Shaq & AI for example.

Ah, well having made in the NBA together I could see Fisher staying with Kobe.

Interesting that the Heat got another guy from Cleveland

Eddie House, Juwan Howard & Mike Miller have signed with the Heat too

Thats interesting, hopefully they all work well with each other and can get the title for the Heat

A few more recent NBA player moves:

- Shaq has joined the Celtics
- Keith Bogans signed by the Bulls
- Pacers traded Troy Murphy to the Nets, who then traded Courtney Lee to the Rockets and the Rockets traded Trevor Ariza to the Hornets. Pacers acquired Darren Collison & James Posey from the Hornets
- T'Wolves traded Ramon Sessions & Ryan Hollins for Delonte West & Sebastian Telfair of the Cavs, they've since waived West.

More here: http://www.nba.com/news/transactions/2010_11/

Hopefully this can get my homestate Pacers going in the right direction as they have been pretty bad in the last several seasons

Found this in my travels

Code:

http://msn.foxsports.com/nba/story/LeBron-James-popularity-plunges-but-Kobe-Bryant-still-more-disliked-athlete-091410

Well just saw a headline on epsn that knicks are going to inquire about Nash and I guess when he might be able to be traded or something

Haven't updated this topic for a long time. Is anyone watching the NBA Playoffs and who do you think will be the new NBA Champions?. I was a Chicago Bulls fan back in the MJ days, so it would be good to see them win the title again. I'm thinking it'll be Bulls/Mavs in the finals, Miami have a strong team but IMO don't have the players yet to support the Big 3 and it will be difficult for them to get past the Bulls with their defense and strong bench. I'd like to see OKC get to the finals too, as their coach Scott Brooks has done a great job with the team and they two quality players in KD & Russell Westbrook.

Well don't really care as the one team I didn't want to go isn't going. They can't be too happy about that.

That said Bulls would nice to see and be kind of a slap to above mentioned teams coach

The Suns lost Stoudamire, who was one of their best players last season and traded Hedo Turkoglu, Jason Richardson and Earl Clark to Orlando and also Goran Dragic to Houston for Aaron Brooks, so the Suns have basically re-built their team during the season, and as they made a major change it broke up a cohesive unit and the team would have lost their consistency. However, they could do better next season although they seem to be in a rebuilding process with Brooks being the eventual replacement for Steve Nash at point guard.

The Dallas Mavericks are the western conference champions after a 4-1 series victory over the Thunder. They'll now be playing either the Heat or Bulls in the Finals. The Bulls/Heat game is tonight and the Heat are currently leading the series 3-1. I think Chicago have been unlikely so far and D-Rose could have tied the series at 2-2 until the Bulls lost in OT.

Former Cleveland Cavs coach Mike Brown has agreed to a four season deal to coach the Lakers.

Well I pretty work under the fact the Az. teams aren't going to make it to anything and then if they do I'm surprised.

Now a new coach for the Lakers could make things real interesting for them but time will tell.

Well its going to be a interesting end to the season to say the least and most of the teams people figured would be here aren't

Well for all the hype Miami Heat got they didn't live up to it. Congrats to Dallas

Same as the NFL, there's also a lock-out between the NBA players and the NBA. Until they agree upon a new collective bargaining agreement (CBA) there won't be a new NBA season. Some players are talking about playing overseas during the lock out. Sonny Weems has signed for a team in Lithuania without a clause stating he can return to the Raptors. Other NBA players talking about playing overseas are Deron Williams & Zaza Pachulia (to play in Turkey), Ron Artest in the UK and Tony Parker in France. It's likely they will return to their NBA teams once the new CBA is agreed upon.

Well as a fan of sports it is sad to see lock outs. As we can't watch or hear anything about it other then to hear about the lock out. I hear the NBA lockout is likely to go longer then the NFL one will. But I do think it is very smart for the players to go play over seas while they wait here. Keeps their skills polished and I'm sure they make a few bucks doing it too.

There is a huge difference in the reasons for the lockouts. I'll see if I can find the story again and post it

not the one I read but should give you a good idea.

Code:

http://www.sbnation.com/nba/2011/7/5/2258052/nba-lockout-nfl-david-stern-roger-goodell

You're right, there's a big difference. Apparently, the NBA lost $300m last season and the league's popularity isn't what it was in the 80's & 90's which is why the NBA and the league owners are looking to reduce salaries. One of the solutions for the NBA is that they need a new superstar or superstars that they can build the league around to help market the NBA to a mass audience. In the 80's they had Magic, Michael Jordan and Larry Bird, in the 90's the NBA star names included Shaq, Jordan, Pippen, Rodman, David Robinson, Penny Hardaway, Karl Malone, John Stockton, Patrick Ewing, Charles Barkley, Clyde Drexler, Hakeem Olajuwon, Gary Payton, Alonzo Mourning, Shawn Kemp and Reggie Miller to name just a few.

The obvious choice now would be Kobe, but he's towards the end of his career. I would have said LeBron, but not sure if that would work since he received a lot of negativity because of the way he left the Cavaliers. Maybe if the Heat win back the support of the NBA fans he could become the new face of the NBA. IMO, a guy who the NBA could have as their new star name is Dwight Howard, and there's also Blake Griffin, Derrick Rose & Kevin Durant who could potentially be the new faces of the NBA too. Plus there's also D-Wade, Chris Paul, Deron Williams, Carmelo Anthony, Marc & Pau Gasol, Dirk Nowitzki (but like Kobe's he is also towards the end of his NBA career), Amar'e Stoudemire, Rajon Rondo, Russel Westbrook, Kevin Love, Monta Ellis, Stephen Curry, Brandon Jennings, LaMarcus Alridge, Josh Smith, Al Horford & Brandon Roy amongst others.

I think the NBA right now has some great players so the quality level of the basketball games themselves are still of a high standard. The league is losing money I think because of not necessarily against the NFL, NHL, MLB and other sports, but because of the internet and the fact that people don't really watch as much TV as they used too. It's not just the NBA too, it's the music, film and TV industries in general, which aren't as profitable and in the case of TV, losing viewers.

The NFL is still a profitable league, but it's a more visible sport in how it's marketed and it's also more visible in terms of international support (for example the Superbowl has millions of viewers around the world) and the NFL built a following in the UK in the 80's which still continues today with the Superbowl being on one of the biggest terrestrial channels.

Maybe if the NBA had that same visibility or some of the same visibilty of the NFL it might be more popular. It would probably be impossible for the NBA to be able to match the popularity of the Jordan era, but maybe if there's another big story like the Heat/Mavericks finals they could be become more popular & therefore more profitable too. But like I said, the NBA etc. have to take into account that now there's many TV channels, the Internet, video games etc. which are competition. Video games existed back in the 80's and 90's too but they weren't as a big an industry that it is now. Same with cable/satellite channels, there was alot but not as many as there is now and also the internet was around in the 90's but didn't have social networking, Youtube etc. so I think that's an important factor to take into account when the NBA and any entertainment/sports company talk about popularity, viewership, profitability etc.