Good morning, Winners! Welcome back to TMW. Thanks so much for reading today. We appreciate you.
Let’s chat a bit about the NBA in-season tournament. I’ll admit when the idea was first announced last season, I was certainly one of the skeptics out there. The tournament seemed like a gimmick — a simple attempt at juicing up numbers in the middle of the NFL season.
But it’s worked perfectly through one month. On Tuesday the group play action wrapped up and now we’re on to the quarterfinals.
Here’s what we have:
East: Bucks (1) vs. Knicks (4), Pacers (2) vs. Celtics (3)
West: Lakers (1) vs. Suns (4), Kings (2) vs. Pelicans
I don’t think things could have shaken out any better for the league. It’s having its cake and eating it, too.
The purpose of this tournament was to get more eyeballs on the league’s up-and-coming stars in smaller markets. Mission accomplished. The next generation is all over this tournament. Tyrese Haliburton’s Indiana Pacers are the No. 1 seed in the East. Zion Williamson’s Pelicans will take on De’Aaron Fox’s Kings in the West. The point of this tournament was to get more eyeballs on stars in smaller markets. Mission accomplished there, too.
Meanwhile, the NBA has its bluebloods involved. The Lakers, Celtics and Knicks are all good simultaneously (for once!). The Lakers made their way into the tournament fairly easily. The Celtics and Knicks had to obliterate teams to make it happen on their end, but alas. Here they are. The cash cows for the NBA made it to the party.
Ultimately, we’ll have to see what the ratings look like behind this thing. But right now, it feels like the NBA has something cooking with this tournament.
Has it been a bit silly at times? Sure. Could the league raise the stakes a bit more? I think so. But there’s no doubt that the league has something cooking with the NBA Cup.
I can’t wait til this thing gets to Vegas.
Speaking of Vegas …
(AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
Adam Silver has made it clear that the NBA wants to bring a team to Las Vegas. It feels more like a matter of “when” and not “if” at this point. Mark Cuban’s recent move might lay a path down to making that “when” sooner rather than later.
The NBA may have just found its path to getting a team to the city. It might just come at the expense of another franchise.
Cuban is reportedly selling his majority stake in the Mavericks but keeping control of the team’s basketball operations. My colleague Bryan Kalbrosky has more here.
“The news was first reported by league insider Marc Stein, who added that Cuban would “continue to retain operational control” of the Mavericks. The longtime majority shareholder will reportedly sell ownership of the franchise to the Adelson family, per reports.
Shams Charania noted that based on the sale, the valuation of the franchise is now $3.5 billion. Charania added that this is “one of the most unique setups” in league history because Cuban will retain his shares in the organization and he will also maintain “full control and final say” when it comes to basketball operations.”
Cuban is still there with the Mavericks and controls basketball operations. I don’t know if he’d ever allow the team to move without a fight. The team has been there for 43 years. Cuban has owned it for 23 years and built it into one of the league’s most notable franchises. Just upending that would be tough.
Plus, I don’t even know if that’s something the NBA would actually want — especially not after the debacle with the SuperSonics.
But the dots are connecting here. There’s no disputing that. Hopefully, Mavericks fans, this is nothing to worry about.
How in the world is Bobby Petrino back?
Mandatory Credit: Beth Hall-USA TODAY Sports
I know the College Football Playoff rankings were announced on Tuesday, but the biggest story in college football yesterday had to be Bobby Petrino somehow going back to Arkansas … as an offensive coordinator.
“This comes after more than a decade after Arkansas fired Petrino. Yes, remember this? The school fired the former head coach in 2012 for hiring the woman he was having an affair with and trying to hide the fact multiple times from Arkansas leadership.
Former Arkansas athletic director Jeff Long excoriated Petrino at the time of his April 2012 firing, per a report from ESPN at the time.”
College football gets wacky. SUPER wacky, sometimes. But this? Man, this goes beyond that. This falls squarely into the “I can’t believe somebody thought this was a good idea” territory. It’s hilarious.
Welcome back, Bobby Petrino. I guess.
Quick hits: This extremely weird Corey Perry story … NFL quarterback rankings … and more
Charles Barkley had some thoughts about Jordan Clarkson’s seafaring outfit and captain’s hat.
Ahead of the Utah Jazz taking on the Los Angeles Lakers in the group stage of the NBA In-Season Tournament on Tuesday night, guard Jordan Clarkson showed up to the game in a very interesting outfit.
Clarkson sported what looked like a captain’s hat and coat like he was about to set off to sea for an adventure, and former NBA star Charles Barkley wasn’t about to let Clarkson slide for his fashion choice without a little trolling.
On the pregame coverage for NBA on TNT, Barkley joked about Clarkson’s outfit, rhetorically asking him if he knew Halloween had already come and gone.
“What the hell is that? Halloween was two weeks ago!”
Ouch! Clarkson’s seafaring hat and outfit was a bold choice for the pregame attire, and Barkley didn’t miss the opportunity to get in a very funny roast.
Maybe Clarkson’s captain’s hat would inspire a great performance on the court? If it did, perhaps Barkley would give him credit for his outfit.
One of these players played a lot and did a lot. The other didn’t really play.
For once, [autotag]Blake Wesley[/autotag] didn’t have to wait until the end of a blowout loss to enter a game. Still, his lone action over the past week came during the first half of the San Antonio Spurs’ NBA In-Season Tournament defeat Nov. 17 to the Sacramento Kings. All he registered in less than four minutes of action was one personal foul.
[autotag]Pat Connaughton[/autotag] had a terrific week, scoring in double figures in back-to-back games for the first time this season. He had 11 points, seven rebounds and three assists in the Milwaukee Bucks’ blowout In-Season Tournament win over the Charlotte Hornets on Nov. 17. The next night was his best game of the season as he finished with 16 points, five boards, three assists and two steals as the Bucks beat the Dallas Mavericks.
For the week, Connaughton averaged 9.0 points, 6.8 rebounds, and 2.8 assists a game while shooting 44.4% from the floor and making nine of his 12 field goals from 3-point range.
Contact/Follow us @IrishWireND on Twitter, and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Notre Dame news, notes, and opinions.
Here’s where the Brooklyn Nets stand in the NBA’s In-Season Tournament after the games that were played on Nov. 14.
The Brooklyn Nets are now 2-1 in the inaugural season of the NBA‘s In-Season Tournament after beating the Orlando Magic 124-104 on Tuesday. Brooklyn is now 6-5 on the season despite dealing with significant injuries to multiple players in the starting lineup that the team is depending on for the success of the franchise.
Within the Nets’ bracket, East Group C, Brooklyn is in second place due to the fact that the first place team, the Boston Celtics, are 1-0 and therefore, have the best winning percentage in the group. It’s still early since the other teams in Brooklyn’s group, the Celtics, Chicago Bulls (0-1), Magic (0-1), and the Toronto Raptors (0-0), each have at least three games left in their In-Season Tournament slate with Toronto still having four games to go.
The good news for the Nets is that while it’s still left to be seen if they can have the best record in the group, they can still make it to the quarterfinals of the In-Season Tournament by having the best record of any team that didn’t win its group. Brooklyn has the Raptors left on its In-Season Tournament slate and has a +8 point differential, fourth-most in the East.
Somehow, Victor Wembanyama got his first-ever tech for bouncing a ball too hard.
San Antonio Spurs rookie phenom Victor Wembanyama had to learn the hard way on Tuesday night that with great wingspan comes great bounce…ability.
While playing in the first night of the NBA’s inaugural In-Season Tournament, Wembanyama accidentally bounced the basketball too hard during a stoppage in play and picked up his first-ever technical foul.
Yes, seriously, Wembanyama got his first tech over accidentally bouncing the ball too hard. You could see that he was surprised how high the ball went into the air after he made a defensive block and just dribbled it hard once the play was over.
The ref here really did not need to give Wembanyama a tech for accidentally bouncing a ball too hard. What are we even doing here, people?
Wembanyama will probably measure his bounces a bit more after this very strange moment, one that we’re not sure will ever really make sense as being the Spurs rookie’s first-ever technical foul.
Here’s where the Brooklyn #Nets stand in the NBA In-Season Tournament through two games played.
The Brooklyn Nets have played two games of their four-game slate in the NBA In-Season Tournament and so far, they have had mixed results. For the purposes of getting to the knockout stage of the In-Season Tournament, Brooklyn can make it out of their bracket by either having the best record in their group or by having a good enough record to be a wildcard team.
So far, the Nets have played the Chicago Bulls and the Boston Celtics within the In-Season Tournament schedule, but the outcomes of those games were vastly different. The Nets played the Bulls on Nov. 3, but escaped Chicago with a 109-107 win after Zach LaVine missed a mid-range jumpshot at the buzzer.
Brooklyn played its second game of the In-Season Tournament at the Celtics on Nov. 10 and lost 121-107. The Nets were missing three starters including the high-scoring Cam Thomas due to a left ankle sprain.
Brooklyn plays its next In-Season Tournament game on Tuesday against the Orlando Magic.
The Brooklyn #Nets are in second place in the East Group C bracket of the #NBA In-Season Tournament. It is also important to note that the Toronto Raptors and the Orlando Magic have not played their tournament games yet. Brooklyn plays Orlando on Tuesday for their third game. https://t.co/UG8s0hj5ar
The reason this post only is about [autotag]Pat Connaughton[/autotag] is because [autotag]Blake Wesley[/autotag] didn’t play at all over the past week. Wesley isn’t injured, but San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich has not called his number lately. It really makes you wonder what Wesley’s future in the Alamo City holds.
Anyway, Connaughton had a modest week in which the Milwaukee Bucks won two of three games. Connaughton’s best game was at the beginning of the week Oct. 30 to help beat the Miami Heat in the second of a back-to-back for the Bucks. He scored eight points and had five rebounds, both highs for him in this young season. He made a single basket and pulled down two boards Nov. 3 in a win over the New York Knicks, which was the Bucks’ first-ever In-Season Tournament game.
For the week, Connaughton averaged 4.3 points and 3.0 rebounds a game while shooting five of 11 from the field and splitting a pair of free throws.
Contact/Follow us @IrishWireND on Twitter, and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Notre Dame news, notes, and opinions.
What’s up, folks! Welcome back to Layup Lines. Thanks so much for chopping it up with me today. I appreciate you.
The in-season tournament is finally here! We’ve been waiting months for this moment and it’s finally culminating. Just in case you need a refresher on how things work for this, here’s a quick one we put together just for the occasion.
It should be lots of fun. It’ll be interesting to see whether this thing works out or not. The stakes aren’t the most riveting — players and coaches of the winning team get to split an $18 million pool.
That’s not nothing, obviously. To be clear, I’m not already trying to fix this idea when it hasn’t presented any problems yet. But I do think there’s a way to raise the stake a bit more for next season if the NBA wants to. It’s a pretty easy add — just involve the NBA playoffs.
“I think the greatest incentive for everybody to do it would be an automatic playoff bid. … If it was a playoff spot, I think everyone would take it very, very serious, right? I think the older teams would take it serious. But then it might … what would [the winning team] do then?”
Now that’s a spicy tournament.
Theoretically, it’s pretty simple to do. If this tournament works out well, the league could spice things up with an automatic playoff berth for the winner. Make it so that the team that wins gets no lower than an automatic 6th seed in the conference.
If you’re one of the top seeds in the playoffs, maybe you get to choose your opponent between the play-in teams that make it in. Or maybe you get to choose your homecourt format for the first round of the playoffs. There are some things the league could throw in to make that interesting for the best teams, too.
It’s probably best the NBA didn’t go that route this year. It’s hard to justify raising the stakes so high on an unproven event. There’s a chance this thing doesn’t go well and nobody likes it. That’s probably not going to happen — but there is a chance!
It’s best to test things out first and see how they work before the stakes are raised again. But don’t be surprised if this is something that’s being considered in a few years. It gives the players something other than cash to play for and makes things a tad bit more riveting.
Just food for thought, though. For now, let’s enjoy the format we do have. Here’s to a good in-season tournament, NBA.
James Harden still doesn’t get it
(AP Photo/Richard Vogel)
On Thursday in his first press conference with the Clippers, James Harden made his best Jay-Z impression. “I’m not a businessman. I’m a business, man,” the hip-hop laureate once famously said.
“When I meant a leash, I don’t mean just shooting the basketball every time. Like, I think the game and I’m a creator on the court. … I’m not a system player. I am a system. You know what I mean?”
I’m not a system player. I am a system. Sheesh.
There were plenty of rumors about Harden wanting a different role in Philadelphia. He didn’t seem to enjoy the play style centered around Joel Embiid. Those were only rumors, though.
Here he kind of confirms all of that. And that’s probably not what you want to hear if you’re a Clippers fan.
Harden is about to be the third option on this team behind both Kawhi Leonard and Paul George. There’s not going to be a ton of room for Harden to create. He’s going to have to feed off of other players. It remains to be seen whether he can do that or not here.
If his last stint in Philly is any indication, he can’t. Let’s hope that’s not true.
What to watch
Make sure you take a good look at each of the NBA’s in-season tournament courts tonight. They’re certainly going to be a sight to behold.
I’ve made my opinion that I don’t like these very clear. Some of them are already beginning to pop up on social media. The Pacers were kind enough to share a time-lapse video of the staff laying the court down and it looks wild.
For years, an in-season NBA tournament felt like one of those far-out ideas that always seemed cool but would probably never be executed.
Fast forward to today and it’s happening.
The NBA’s in-season tournament is finally here. The league has been building up to this moment for the last few years and now we’re actually going to see what this thing looks like and how it’ll work out.
That’s the big question everyone has: How exactly does this thing work? The NBA is going to be an American basketball version of a soccer league. It’s going to be pretty strange. It could also be pretty fun, too.
Let’s take a look at everything we know about it so far.
