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Cavaliers

The Golden State Warriors and Philadelphia 76ers inquired about Los Angeles Lakers superstar LeBron James prior to the NBA&rsquo;s trade deadline on February 8, according to <a href="https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/39523705/sources-warriors-made-bid-lebron-james-trade-deadline" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ESPN&rsquo;s Adrian Wojnarowski and Ramona Shelburne.</a>
Warriors owner Joe Lacob (with the encouragement of star forward Draymond Green) reached out to Lakers owner Jeanie Buss to inquire about the availability of James in hopes of pairing him with longtime rival Stephen Curry. However, Buss (and James) quickly turned down Golden State.
After struggling to make waves all season, the Warriors attempted to add James at the deadline and extend their dynastic run. Even at 39 years old, James is still playing at a high level with a skill set that would complement Curry, Green and Klay Thompson.
ESPN <a href="https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/39523705/sources-warriors-made-bid-lebron-james-trade-deadline" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a>: &ldquo;Buss told Lacob the Lakers had no desire to trade James, but that he would need to seek the answer on James' state of mind from his agent, Klutch Sports CEO Rich Paul, sources said. As an owner, Buss has operated with the mindset that she wants her star players content with the franchise, and that instructed her thinking on referring Warriors leadership to James' representation, sources said.&nbsp;
"If the Lakers ever wanted a temperature check on James' commitment, here was his chance. In the end, the answer was returned resoundingly on the eve of the trade deadline: Paul told Lacob and Warriors GM Mike Dunleavy Jr., that James had no interest in a trade and wanted to remain a Laker, sources said. When Dunleavy reached out to Lakers GM Rob Pelinka in those pre-trade deadline hours, Dunleavy had been told the same: The Lakers wanted to keep James."
Green, who is also represented by Rich Paul&rsquo;s Klutch Sports, went the extra mile and asked Paul to help persuade James to come to Golden State, but to no avail.
&ldquo;Earlier Wednesday, Green -- whom Paul also represents at Klutch -- had sent Paul a text message soliciting his help in convincing James to join him in Golden State, sources said. Once, Green had been a lead recruiter on Kevin Durant's free agency signing with Golden State, but this was a far different, far more futile 11th-hour pursuit," Wojnarowski and Shelburne <a href="https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/39523705/sources-warriors-made-bid-lebron-james-trade-deadline" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a>.
Moreover, Sixers president of basketball operations Daryl Morey also joined in the LeBron James sweepstakes but was immediately denied by Lakers general manager Rob Pelinka. Wojnarowski and Shelburne revealed that Pelinka responded to Morey by asking if superstar Joel Embiid was available, but that immediately ended their trade conversation.
&ldquo;Dunleavy was the second team executive call to Pelinka on a possible James trade, sources said. After seeing James' cryptic social media post of an hourglass a week before the trade deadline, Philadelphia 76ers president of basketball operations Daryl Morey called Pelinka to probe on a James trade and was immediately told that James wasn't available," the <a href="https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/39523705/sources-warriors-made-bid-lebron-james-trade-deadline" target="_blank" rel="noopener">report states</a>. "In fact, Pelinka responded by asking Morey if Joel Embiid was available, sources said. And that ended that brief conversation.&rdquo;
Ultimately, James stayed put in Los Angeles and two sides remain committed to each other for the rest of the season as they look to gain important positioning for the playoffs. The Lakers currently sit in ninth place in the Western Conference with a 29-26 record.

The Warriors and 76ers inquired about Lakers superstar LeBron James prior to the NBA trade deadline, according to ESPN.

Warriors, 76ers tried to acquire Lakers' LeBron James before deadline

Entering the 2022-23 NBA season, the Golden State Warriors were determined to defend their title.
However, after a season full of ups and downs, the Warriors ultimately earned the sixth seed in the Western Conference and were eliminated by the Los Angeles Lakers in the second round of the playoffs.
This has been a busy offseason for the Warriors, and the franchise will look different (on and off the court) next year. General manager Mike Dunleavy Jr. took over the front office after the departure of Bob Myers, and he didn't wait long to start putting his fingerprints all over the roster.
While the core of Stephen Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green will be back, the Warriors added veterans Chris Paul, Cory Joseph and Dario Saric as well as rookies Brandin Podziemski (No. 19 overall) and Trayce Jackson-Davis (No. 57 overall). Jordan Poole was dealt to the Washington Wizards (along with Ryan Rollins and Patrick Baldwin Jr.), and Donte DiVincenzo signed with the New York Knicks.
The Warriors made it clear that their top priority this summer was retaining Green, and they gave him a four-year, $100 million contract. While the Warriors could have gone younger, they instead decided to add veterans and chase their fifth championship in 10 years.
Warriors head coach Steve Kerr recently opened up about what went wrong last season, taking some of the blame for the team's struggles.
&ldquo;I will say that I feel like I failed last year in connecting the group,&rdquo; Kerr told <a href="https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/07/20/steve-kerr-shares-thoughts-on-mike-dunleavy-jr-s-offseason-chris-paul-and-personal-goals/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Shayna Rubin of the San Jose Mercury-News</a>. &ldquo;I have taken a lot of time this summer to think about last year, things I could have and should have done differently. I really believe that sometimes losing sort of forces you to reassess and reevaluate and I&rsquo;m excited about coming back next year with a renewed focus and energy and spirit from the entire group. And that starts with me, and I can&rsquo;t wait.&rdquo;
Green punching Poole during training camp likely had a significant impact behind the scenes. Kerr's comment also lines up with a recent report from Monte Poole of NBC Sports Bay Area that Green and Jonathan Kuminga don't have a relationship, but the Warriors hope that can be resolved.
"[Green and Kuminga not having a relationship] is a problem and it can only be fixed by Draymond," Monte Poole <a href="https://twitter.com/957thegame/status/1682129190450253825?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said on 95.7 The Game</a>. "The new contract implies the Warriors believe he can fix it, but around the league there are a lot of people saying, 'I don't know.'"
Kerr also opened up about Golden State's recent additions. When asked if Paul will start (as he's done throughout his whole career), Kerr said that the decision will come later.
&ldquo;All of that will happen in training camp,&rdquo; Kerr <a href="https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/07/20/steve-kerr-shares-thoughts-on-mike-dunleavy-jr-s-offseason-chris-paul-and-personal-goals/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told Rubin</a>. &ldquo;Until we get everyone on the floor, we won&rsquo;t be able to assess what&rsquo;s best for our team and how everything is going to look. But I&rsquo;m very confident that it&rsquo;s going to work out. We got great guys and we got champions, great competitors. There&rsquo;s one goal next year, and that&rsquo;s to win at the highest possible level. Everything else will unfold as the season does.&rdquo;
Kerr seems excited about the additions of Joseph and Saric as well.
&ldquo;We needed guys like Saric and Cory Joseph who have been through the NBA rigors and understand what it means to be a leader from the middle of the roster and how important that is,&rdquo; Kerr <a href="https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/07/20/steve-kerr-shares-thoughts-on-mike-dunleavy-jr-s-offseason-chris-paul-and-personal-goals/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told Rubin</a>, later adding, &ldquo;Mike really recognized that was an area we needed help, so he went out without many resources and fortified our roster and put us in position moving forward...
&ldquo;He understands that we have a window that&rsquo;s still open. I think he&rsquo;s fortified our roster with some really good veteran players and veteran leaders and balanced out the roster to where we have a better ratio of vets to young guys.&rdquo;
The Warriors can never be counted out as contenders, and it's certainly possible that their dynastic run will continue.

Steve Kerr recently took some of the blame for the Warriors' recent struggles, saying that he failed "in connecting the group."

Steve Kerr opens up about new-look Warriors, what went wrong last year

<a class="Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement" href="https://apnews.com/article/chris-paul-trade-golden-state-jordan-poole-d26c307001fd0cc6ce5835bdb09b0030" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Chris Paul has already been traded</a>&nbsp;twice this offseason, ending up with Golden State.&nbsp;<a class="Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement" href="https://apnews.com/article/wizards-suns-trade-bradley-beal-55adab5fa31d5dfbc35b83223743d9c6" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Bradley Beal</a>&nbsp;is now with Phoenix,&nbsp;<a class="Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement" href="https://apnews.com/article/hawks-jazz-trade-collins-gay-a6567f15f798ebf9fc99612ad00e4a7f" target="_blank" rel="noopener">John Collins</a>&nbsp;was sent to Utah, and&nbsp;<a class="Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement" href="https://apnews.com/article/celtics-wizards-kristaps-porzingis-marcus-smart-grizzlies-94e7fa907d2523a354665b8c6ce0908c" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kristaps Porzingis</a>&nbsp;is about to start anew with Boston in a deal that sent Marcus Smart to Memphis.
They have new places to call home. It&rsquo;s time to see if&nbsp;<a class="Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement" href="https://apnews.com/article/mavericks-kyrie-irving-luka-doncic-nico-harrison-9a3d80b6c325195faedde1a6324a4e51" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kyrie Irving</a>,&nbsp;<a class="Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement" href="https://apnews.com/article/draymond-green-option-nba-482b28f097e3c99a934fff1ea46137b8" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Draymond Green</a>,&nbsp;<a class="Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement" href="https://apnews.com/article/nba-milwaukee-bucks-khris-middleton-197ecec12092f80f9988bf6d6670680e" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Khris Middleton</a>&nbsp;and dozens more will be on the move in the next few days.
As proven by the run of trades in recent weeks, and big news from James Harden on Thursday, NBA teams aren&rsquo;t waiting for free agency to make moves. The window of offseason player movement begins Friday at 6 p.m. EDT, when teams are permitted to start talking to free agents &mdash; with the caveat that most deals cannot become official until July 6.
&ldquo;Obviously, money&rsquo;s a thing. I mean, that&rsquo;s just for anybody,&rdquo; said Miami guard Max Strus, a free agent who&rsquo;s in line for a big payday, going from $1.8 million last season to potentially $12 million a year or more. &ldquo;These are moments that you work for, and these are opportunities that could be life-changing &mdash; so you can&rsquo;t ever take that out of it. But I love playing basketball and that&rsquo;s always going to be the first thing for me.&rdquo;
Money and fit. That&rsquo;s what players like Strus will be seeking, and that&rsquo;s what teams will be weighing over the next few days &mdash; especially with a new&nbsp;<a class="Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement" href="https://apnews.com/article/nba-labor-players-0cf524b13e459eeb5853dad9a455e0e0" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Collective Bargaining Agreement</a>, and new rules designed to at least slightly curb spending by the deeper-pocketed teams, set to go into effect on Saturday.
That&rsquo;s part of the reason some trades have been made in recent days and more are almost certainly coming. The Warriors gave up Jordan Poole to get Paul from Washington in part because Paul&rsquo;s contract expires in a year and Poole is on the books for four years (at more than $30 million annually on average), and Atlanta sent Collins to Utah for Rudy Gay for similar reasons.
Harden could be the next big name on the move. He decided not to enter free agency and exercised his $35.6 million option for the coming season Thursday, with Philadelphia now likely to trade the 10-time All-Star and three-time scoring champion,&nbsp;<a class="Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement" href="https://apnews.com/article/76ers-james-harden-free-agency-d9f9a6fa001d68e58f04cd60251802ab" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a person familiar with the decision told The Associated Press.</a>
&ldquo;I think a lot can be made of all the challenges that are coming our way, whether it be aging roster, the new CBA with some of the limitations there, anything else you can bring up,&rdquo; Warriors general manager Mike Dunleavy Jr. said. &ldquo;We&rsquo;re aware of all those things. But we also feel like we&rsquo;re in a great, great place, because we&rsquo;ve got a competitive owner willing to spend ... so we feel confident we can navigate it.&rdquo;
Another potential trade: Plenty of eyes remain on Portland and whether Damian Lillard will ask to be dealt elsewhere &mdash; to Miami or Brooklyn, specifically &mdash; or remain with the Trail Blazers for a 12th season.
In the interim, there will be some massive deals struck &mdash; some possibly reaching $200 million.
Green turned down a $27.5 million option with Golden State to seek a longer deal. Milwaukee has decisions to make with both Middleton and Brook Lopez, two key members of their championship in 2021.
&ldquo;Both of those guys specifically are core to who we have been,&rdquo; Bucks general manager Jon Horst said. &ldquo;Ultimately, what matters is we&rsquo;re hopeful to have them back. We&rsquo;ve been really good and they&rsquo;re a big part of that and we want to try to keep them.&rdquo;
There&rsquo;s also intrigue in Dallas with regard to Irving&rsquo;s future.
Irving&rsquo;s talent is unquestioned. He averaged 27 points in 20 games with the Mavericks after getting traded there for the stretch run last season. For his career, he&rsquo;s averaged 23.4 points, is an eight-time All-Star and won a title alongside LeBron James in Cleveland in 2016.
He and Luka Doncic could form one of the league&rsquo;s most powerful 1-2 punches. Irving also is coming off a season where he was suspended by Brooklyn for eight games after the team said it was dismayed by his repeated failure to &ldquo;unequivocally say he has no antisemitic beliefs.&rdquo; And that saga came after many others involving Irving, who has raised eyebrows for things ranging from saying the Earth is flat to not getting vaccinated against COVID-19.
Still unclear: How many years, and how much money, Dallas will commit to keep him.
&ldquo;Obviously, he&rsquo;s someone that we&rsquo;ve already told everybody that we want to re-sign and we&rsquo;re excited about,&rdquo; Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison said.
The new champions have a big decision looming as well.
Denver&rsquo;s biggest free agency issue is versatile guard Bruce Brown, who was tremendous off the bench for the Nuggets during their run to the NBA title. All the Nuggets can offer Brown is one year at $7.8 million; other teams, such as the Los Angeles Lakers, may be prepared to offer more. Denver can give Brown a longer, richer deal next summer &mdash; so it&rsquo;s up to Brown to decide whether to bet on himself or get more money now.
At the team&rsquo;s championship parade, Nuggets coach Michael Malone made clear that Denver intends to keep Brown.
&ldquo;Is Brucie B going anywhere? Hell no,&rdquo;&nbsp;<a class="Link AnClick-LinkEnhancement" href="https://youtu.be/oqwc1vg1mCY?t=242" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Malone shouted, as the crowd roared in approval.</a> &ldquo;Hell no. Hell no. We&rsquo;re running this ... back.&rdquo;
The next few days will tell if Malone is right.

It’s time to see if Kyrie Irving, Draymond Green, Khris Middleton and dozens more free agents will be on the move in the next few days.

Busy NBA offseason continues with free agency starting today

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) &mdash; The Golden State Warriors want to keep Draymond Green, yet the team is prepared for him to formally decline his $27.5 million player option for the final year of his contract next season and become an unrestricted free agent seeking a long-term deal.
The Athletic reported Monday that Green would opt out. Green, who said in April he wants to retire with Golden State, would have to notify the Warriors of his decision by June 30.
&ldquo;I saw the report, too. Until we get the paperwork and the filing we can&rsquo;t really comment or say much,&rdquo; new general manager Mike Dunleavy Jr. said Monday at his introductory news conference. &ldquo;I will say it, I think Steve (Kerr) has said it, I&rsquo;ll reiterate, we really want Draymond back. What he means to this organization and this team in terms of trying to win at the highest level, we feel like we have to have him. So that&rsquo;s very important.&rdquo;
Kerr has applauded Green&rsquo;s fiery, emotional play. The season began with Green punching Jordan Poole at practice during training camp then taking a brief leave of absence from the team.
This spring, Green served a one-game suspension during the Warriors&rsquo; 114-97 Game 3 victory in the first round of the playoffs that Golden State won in seven games. He&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/draymond-green-suspension-playoffs-3306ac01060deaf104f77113fd3b66b1">vowed afterward not to change</a>.
&ldquo;Draymond won&rsquo;t be moved by no Draymond rules,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I will continue to play the game how I play the game, operate how I operate, be exactly who I am, because that leads to winning.&rdquo;
In the fourth quarter of the Kings&rsquo; 114-106 Game 2 win,&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/nba-playoffs-2023-draymond-green-ejected-075df068895834184e0877648d513b0a">Green stepped on the chest of Sacramento center Domantas Sabonis</a>&nbsp;after Stephen Curry grabbed a defensive rebound.
In 2016, Green was suspended for a crucial Game 5 loss to LeBron James and the Cavaliers in the NBA Finals after accumulating too many flagrant fouls in the playoffs that season. The Warriors wound up losing in seven.
Dunleavy and owner Joe Lacob know there&rsquo;s much to do better this summer with the expectations that the Warriors will contend for another championship next season.
And, they hope, with Green a part of that core of players along with Curry and Klay Thompson that has won four titles together.
&ldquo;Look, he&rsquo;s been a spectacular player for us. We would not have these championships without his involvement, no question,&rdquo; Lacob said of Green.
&ldquo;I think everyone understands that in this room. He&rsquo;s meant a lot to this franchise. He&rsquo;s a bit of a controversial player perhaps in some corners around the league, certain things that have happened over the years. He knows that. We know that. But the good overwhelms the bad is what I would say.
&ldquo;... He&rsquo;s meant a lot. I think if he does come back that he will be very important to our success certainly going forward in the next few years.&rdquo;
Dunleavy, promoted from assistant GM to replace Bob Myers, is optimistic of keeping the roster together &mdash; Poole and the younger players, too.
Curry, Green and Thompson are still competing at an elite level.
&ldquo;That&rsquo;s our hope. We love those guys and value them. I think there is a way to do it. That&rsquo;s something we&rsquo;ll have to work through. It certainly is possible,&rdquo; Dunleavy said. &ldquo;The big thing is those guys are still playing at a high level. Steph conservatively is one of the top five players in the league. Draymond just had an incredible year. Essentially first team all defense. We&rsquo;re biased. One of the premiere defenders in the league. Klay has really returned well from his Achilles injury and his knee. Those guys are playing well at an older age.&rdquo;

The Golden State Warriors want to keep Draymond Green, says the team's new general manager Mike Dunleavy Jr.

Dunleavy: Warriors are committed to keeping Draymond Green

Back injuries are incredibly common in professional sports, particularly in the NBA. But just because they&rsquo;re common does not make them easy to overcome &mdash; and Ben Simmons can attest to that.
Simmons is a big, dynamic playmaker whose defensive versatility and speed set him apart from the vast majority of guards in the NBA. And, right or not, the Brooklyn Nets were relying on Simmons to contribute in their first-round playoff series against the Boston Celtics.
After a number of reports suggested a Simmons comeback was imminent, we now know that was not meant to be.
The media didn&rsquo;t help, as rumblings surfaced that Simmons was pain-free following a practice and could return to the team as early as Game 3. Simmons didn&rsquo;t help his case either, and at one point beckoned to ESPN's Nick Friedell to film him <a href="https://twitter.com/YahooSports/status/1515377280129806340?s=20&amp;t=dhtvXHosNXvt8FuOZ4T1kg" target="_blank" rel="noopener">dunking the basketball</a> after a recent practice.
We don&rsquo;t necessarily know why Simmons didn&rsquo;t play in the Nets&rsquo; first-round series. Maybe he suffered a setback, or maybe he wasn&rsquo;t as healthy as we were led to believe. Per The Athletic's Shams Charania, his mental health <a href="https://www.basketballnews.com/stories/shams-ben-simmons-did-not-return-because-of-mental-block" target="_blank" rel="noopener">was also a major factor</a>.
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But while reports about his potential availability misled many of us, <a href="https://rahulshahmd.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. Rahul Shah</a>, a world renowned, board-certified orthopedic spine surgeon, cautioned against getting too excited from the very start.
&ldquo;Simmons received a shot a few weeks ago,&rdquo; Dr. Shah told BasketballNews.com in a Zoom interview in late March. &ldquo;If you&rsquo;re not seeing him practice, warming up with the team, 3-on-3s &mdash; if he&rsquo;s not doing that, you can be pretty certain he&rsquo;s not getting the relief he needs.&rdquo;
We last saw Simmons on the floor in the 2021 Eastern Conference semifinals, but he sat out of this season's training camp in hopes of pressuring the Philadelphia 76ers to trade him. The Sixers didn&rsquo;t relent... at least not quickly.
Simmons' hold-out cost him 54 games (and approximately $20 million, over which he filed a grievance in early April), and on Feb. 10, he was finally traded to Brooklyn.
As mentioned earlier, Simmons dealt with mental-health issues for the entirety of the 2021-22 season and possibly longer. It was initially <a href="https://twitter.com/ramonashelburne/status/1491841027153412096?s=20&amp;t=johir1tYZUwQ_s5HLqg4-Q" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported by ESPN&rsquo;s Ramona Shelburne</a> that Simmons &ldquo;will continue to work with his therapist to get mentally ready to play in Brooklyn.&rdquo; But there was no mention of a back injury &mdash; at least not initially.
One of the main challenges in understanding where Simmons was in his recovery as of a week ago was that the injury wasn&rsquo;t proactively reported. Even Nets head coach Steve Nash seemed unclear on his status for much of the time following the trade.
Nash referred to Simmons&rsquo; back injury as &ldquo;a little soreness&rdquo; in late February. In mid-March, he had &ldquo;extremely high hopes&rdquo; that Simmons would return in the regular season. But in late March, Nash finally conceded that &ldquo;someone&rdquo; had reported that Simmons had a herniated disc.
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Was Nash being intentionally coy? Or was he truly unaware of the extent of Simmons&rsquo; back issues?
It&rsquo;s worth mentioning that Simmons has a mostly uneventful injury history as it relates to his back. The most recent occurrence was when he missed nine games with a nerve impingement in February 2020, but there have been no reported complications since.
Something clearly happened between June 2021 and February 2022.
<a href="https://rahulshahmd.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Dr. Shah</a> told BasketballNews.com that herniated discs typically require three-to-six months for a full recovery. Could Simmons have really injured his back after being traded? Or just before?
It&rsquo;s possible, but not relevant.
Regardless of when it happened, we can probably blame Simmons' hold-out for much of it. Training camp and the preseason are important to warm up for a relatively long season. Getting back into shape after skipping training camp and preseason and missing months of a season is nearly impossible &mdash; even for someone as athletic as Simmons.
Even worse, Simmons&rsquo; injury could have long-term implications for the Nets.
With Simmons having received an epidural shot in mid-March, Dr. Shah walked BasketballNews.com through the process and timeline of a typical recovery from a herniated disc.
&ldquo;Shots are one step before surgery, and that&rsquo;s why Simmons was having shots,&rdquo; Dr. Shah explained. "If that doesn&rsquo;t work, why not? It can be because it&rsquo;s the wrong problem, but it can also be that more has to be done. Typically, with surgery &mdash; when you go to that area &mdash; you identify where the disc is pressing on that nerve. You go in and basically trim down the area; you just remove a small portion. But if you&rsquo;re torquing on that area, there&rsquo;s a chance that more disc can come out.
&ldquo;So, you want to limit risk as much as you can. You want to always take the least amount of risk, but sometimes it&rsquo;s not enough. This operation is very effective but there is a 5-to-15% chance of more disc coming out in the future.&rdquo;
Dr. Shah also explained that, while surgery is generally successful, the risk it presents leads many people to try rehab and shots first.
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&ldquo;People return to twice as many games and play for twice as long with the surgery than without it,&rdquo; Dr. Shah explained. &ldquo;But there is a risk with it. And that&rsquo;s why most people don&rsquo;t go with it immediately.
&ldquo;So, for Ben Simmons, the likelihood of him needing this kind of surgery is probably reasonable, maybe 60% or 70%. And the real question is, &lsquo;Can he return back and play at the highest level with the shot?&rsquo; If he can&rsquo;t, you have your answer.&rdquo;
While the Nets&rsquo; season is done, Simmons could have decisions to make that will directly impact his ability to play next season. Granted, Simmons&rsquo; mental health is at least equally important as his physical health, especially to him; but if Simmons&rsquo; is to be successful, his back must be healthy.
According to the Mayo Clinic, a diskectomy &mdash; a surgical procedure to remove the damaged portion of a herniated disk in your spine &mdash; requires at least 6-to-8 weeks of recovery time. For context, Dwight Howard was expected to miss <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-basketball-nba-was-howard/wizards-howard-says-hes-pain-free-after-surgery-idUSKCN1OI2K4" target="_blank" rel="noopener">2-to-3 months</a> following a microdiscectomy in late 2018, and Mike Dunleavy was projected to miss <a href="https://www.si.com/nba/2015/09/25/chicago-bulls-mike-dunleavy-back-surgery-injury-update" target="_blank" rel="noopener">8-to-10 weeks</a> in 2015 following the same procedure.
Simmons and the Nets have about five months until the start of training camp. So, while he technically has some time, Simmons should make a decision regarding how he'll proceed sooner than later.
In a recent <a href="https://hoopshype.com/lists/nets-rumors-kyrie-irving-kevin-durant-ben-simmons-steve-nash-bruce-brown-nicolas-claxton/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">HoopsHype podcast with the Daily News' Kristian Winfield</a>, Mike Scotto said the Nets hope Simmons can guard an opposing team&rsquo;s best player on any given night, regardless of position. In other words, in a given (hypothetical) week, Simmons will be expected to guard the likes of LeBron James, Ja Morant, Luka Doncic, Giannis Antetokounmpo and more.
That is a very tall task for any player, but it&rsquo;s downright impossible if said player has a lingering injury &mdash; especially in his back. And given what was given up to get Simmons to Brooklyn (and the fact that most teams around the league want nothing to do with him at the moment), the Nets have to hope he'll bounce back to his old self.&nbsp;
It might seem crazy, but Ben Simmons is still only 25. He truly could have a decade or more left in the NBA. Hopefully he's able to overcome all of his challenges &mdash; physical and otherwise.
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Dr. Rahul Shah says there was a 60-70% chance that Ben Simmons needed back surgery in late March. Could the Nets have known?

Ben Simmons' Brooklyn no-show was more predictable than we thought

Kyle Lowry has been teammates with many of the best players in the world. He won an NBA championship in Toronto. He helped the U.S. capture an Olympic gold medal five years ago. He&rsquo;s been to the All-Star Game six times.
When he gets around such players, he always sees the same thing.
&ldquo;They&rsquo;re really, really ... good. Like, they&rsquo;re really good,&rdquo; Lowry said.
Talent, Lowry insists, isn&rsquo;t enough to win. But talent and smarts -- the combination that he believes exists with the Miami Heat -- can take a team a very long way That&rsquo;s why he&rsquo;s in a new uniform for the first time in nearly a decade.
Lowry is Miami&rsquo;s new point guard, forming a trio with Bam Adebayo and Jimmy Butler that the Heat hope will be enough to get them back into title contention.
&ldquo;He&rsquo;s just a great winner,&rdquo; Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said of Lowry. &ldquo;He knows how to impact winning. You can look at all the accolades, he&rsquo;s a decorated player, and all of it is earned. But when you weave through all of that &mdash; the All-NBA&rsquo;s, the All-Stars, the Olympic team, all of this stuff &mdash; it really boils down to him finding a way to impact winning, and he does it on both ends of the court.&rdquo;
The Heat are barely more than a calendar year removed from going to the 2020 NBA Finals; that series ended Oct. 11, 2020. But last year&rsquo;s team never got firing like that one did, and wound up getting swept in the first round by eventual NBA champion Milwaukee.
So, Miami spent the summer getting tougher. Lowry was acquired from Toronto in a deal that sent Goran Dragic to the Raptors. The Heat added rugged forwards P.J. Tucker and Markieff Morris as free agents, ensured Butler wouldn&rsquo;t be free anytime soon by getting him to sign an extension and kept sharpshooter Duncan Robinson around with a new deal as well.
Tucker, Morris and Lowry all have NBA championships. That wasn&rsquo;t lost on Robinson.
&ldquo;They have experience and championship pedigree,&rdquo; Robinson said. &ldquo;They all have their own games and what they bring, but from an approach standpoint, they have a common thread. Miami, as an organization, we have a very clear vision of how we want to be how we want to play. I feel like this team, as much as any team I&rsquo;ve been on here in Miami, aligns with that vision really, really well.&rdquo;
BIG DEALS
Between Lowry, Butler, Adebayo and Robinson alone, the Heat have committed &mdash; just in the last 12 months &mdash; more than $500 million in contracts. All are locked up for at least the next three seasons, while Robinson is for four and Adebayo for five. Tyler Herro is extension-eligible after this season and the Heat remain quite high on his potential, so it&rsquo;s possible that the current core could be Miami&rsquo;s core for years to come.
MOVING UP
Spoelstra should move into the top 25 of all-time winningest NBA coaches this season. He&rsquo;s currently 27th with 607 wins, six behind Mike Dunleavy and 21 behind Doug Moe. He&rsquo;s also one of only six coaches ever with at least 607 wins, a .589 winning percentage and 85 playoff victories -- a club alongside Phil Jackson, Gregg Popovich, Red Auerbach, Jerry Sloan and Heat President Pat Riley.
LITTLE BIG MAN
Lowry is listed at only 6 feet, though he could give Miami a rebounding boost this season. Among players 6 feet or shorter, only Chris Paul has more rebounds than Lowry in NBA history. Lowry has averaged 5.2 rebounds per game over the last four seasons and may help a Heat team that ranked 24th in the NBA in rebounds per 100 possessions last season &mdash; 29th overall in total rebounds.
GOLD WINNERS
With Adebayo being part of the team that won gold this past summer at the Tokyo Games, the Heat now have three current players who can say they are Olympic champions. Butler and Lowry were teammates on the team that won gold for the U.S. at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics. Miami is one of four teams to currently have at least three gold medalists, joining the Los Angeles Lakers, Brooklyn and Golden State.
THE SCHEDULE
The start of the season will be daunting and potentially telling for the Heat. Miami begins with a 13-game stretch against 12 different teams that won nearly 60% of their games last season. The Heat went 11-23 against those 12 teams last season and were outscored by 7.5 points on average in those contests, including playoffs. They were also a combined 0-8 against Dallas, Denver, Memphis and the Los Angeles Clippers. Against all other clubs last season, Miami went 29-13.

Kyle Lowry is Miami’s new point guard, forming a trio with Bam Adebayo and Jimmy Butler with the Heat.

With Lowry, Heat hoping for run back to NBA title contention

In the latest BasketballNews.com roundtable, we asked our writers the following question:
Which player from a previous era would be a perfect fit in today&rsquo;s NBA?
Alex Kennedy: Rather than selecting a legend like Larry Bird who would obviously be incredible in today&rsquo;s NBA, I chose a player who was solid in his era but whose career would&rsquo;ve played out very differently if he was drafted today: <a href="https://youtu.be/faK8ElMK2B4" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Jamal Mashburn</a>. In his prime, Mashburn averaged 21.6 points, 6.1 rebounds, 5.6 assists, 1.5 threes and 1.0 steal while shooting 38.9% from three. He was 6-foot-8 and roughly 250 lbs. (the same size as Julius Randle). Here's how a 1993 pre-draft scouting report described him: &ldquo;Mashburn is a jack of all trades. He can play either inside or outside. Inside, he has a variety of moves, a la Kevin McHale, with all sorts of head fakes and turnaround moves. He can be virtually unstoppable in the low post. If that isn't enough, he can take his game outside, where he can easily stroke the three-pointer. He is an excellent ball-handler, and he can score from a set shot, posting up, and off the dribble.&rdquo; In today&rsquo;s NBA, Mashburn would play multiple positions; he would be a terrific stretch-four and small-ball five. But back in the day, he played 84% of his 16,217 NBA minutes at small forward. These days, he&rsquo;d also attempt more than just 3.6 threes per game. A team could run their offense through Mashburn since he could create his own shot and get his teammates involved. Today, he&rsquo;d be highly coveted due to his versatility, athleticism, shooting, touch around the rim and playmaking. He was incredibly talented (and underrated), and it&rsquo;s unfortunate that he wasn&rsquo;t born a few decades later.
Spencer Davies: It's not as if Rashard Lewis had a poor career -- especially judging by his contributions over a decade with the Seattle SuperSonics and Orlando Magic, where he averaged 18 points and nearly six rebounds per game on 39.4% from long distance -- but it is so easy to picture him in the modern NBA stretching the floor and jacking up 8-to-10 threes and nailing 40-plus percent of them. Later down the line, he was a bigger body with more strength, however, in the mid-2000s, he just had the length that would bother you defensively. Lewis would probably be able to easily average 20-plus points these days. He was quite adaptable despite being a 3/4 tweener, but in June 2021, he would be exactly what these teams are frothing at the mouth for: length, athleticism and most importantly, shooting.
Moke Hamilton: Definitely an interesting question. Vlade Divac and Arvydas Sabonis are two that immediately come to mind for me, with Sabonis being particularly interesting. For those of you who are younger than me, Sabonis &mdash; the father of NBA All-Star Domantas Sabonis &mdash; is a great &ldquo;what if?&rdquo; in NBA history. Without taking a long stroll down memory lane, Sabonis was a truly gifted big man whose NBA career never became what it should have been. He was able to make plays from the interior, had magnificent court vision and shot 32% of his career looks from more than 10 feet from the basket. He shot over 100 three-pointers in each of his first three seasons in Portland and connected on about 34% of them. But when Mike Dunleavy took over head-coaching duties prior to Sabonis&rsquo; fourth year, things changed, to say the least. Seriously, go Google Arvydas and check out his personal story. It&rsquo;s incredible&hellip; And he would&rsquo;ve fit right in with today&rsquo;s NBA&hellip; Just like his son.
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Nekias Duncan: I&rsquo;ll go off the cuff: I would&rsquo;ve loved to see how scalable Detlef Schrempf&rsquo;s game would&rsquo;ve been today. A 6-foot-10 forward who could shoot (criminally low three-point volume), and play-make the way he could would&rsquo;ve been incredibly valuable.
Jannelle Moore: Scottie Pippen is the quintessential choice for a player from a previous era who would be great today. Why? Because Scottie would kill on defense -- a versatile wing who could guard all positions. Furthermore, he can facilitate. And Pippen in transition with today&rsquo;s space and tempo would be scary.
Ethan Fuller: I beg younger basketball fans to go watch highlights of Dana Barros in the 1990s. Barros was a simply unreal shooter caught in an era where three-point shooting took a back seat. He shot at least 39% from three in 10 of his 13 full seasons while flying around off screens and off the dribble. At his peak with the 76ers in 1994-95, Barros averaged 20.6 points, 7.5 assists and 1.8 points per game while hitting 50 points in one contest. But Barros only attempted at least 5.0 threes per game in one season. If he played today, he'd be a premier shot-making point guard and absolutely lethal with the emphasis on floor spacing. Think peak Isaiah Thomas with even more shooting upside.

Which player from a previous era would be perfect fit in today's NBA? BasketballNews.com writers shared their thoughts.

Roundtable: Which former player would fit perfectly in today’s NBA?

The following is an excerpt of L. Jon Wertheim's book, &ldquo;<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Glory-Days-Changed-Culture-Forever/dp/1328637247" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Glory Days: The Summer of 1984 and the 90 Days That Changed Sports and Culture Forever</a>,&rdquo; which is out today <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Glory-Days-Changed-Culture-Forever/dp/1328637247" target="_blank" rel="noopener">on Amazon</a>. 
In Indianapolis, a popular 1984 parlor game entailed coming up with the best comparison for the Hoosier Dome, the white monstrosity that had sprouted to blight the city&rsquo;s skyline. It&rsquo;s like a giant biscuit made from scratch. No, it looks more like a giant pile of white deer crap. The indoor venue was built with the intent of enticing a professional football team to relocate to town&mdash;and on those grounds, it was stunningly successful. On March 28, 1984, the Colts organization had loaded up a fleet of moving vans, left Baltimore under cover of darkness, and decamped to Indianapolis.
But with the 1984 NFL season still weeks away, the first event held inside the Hoosier Dome was, appropriately, a basketball game. As Bob Knight, the unofficial emcee, told the crowd that night, July 9, 1984, &ldquo;I heard today that basketball was invented in Springfield, Massachusetts, and that is true.&rdquo; (Pause for effect.) &ldquo;God had it invented there so we could import it to Indiana.&rdquo; Deafening applause followed.
Knight and his minions had come to Indianapolis as part of a pre-Olympic summer barnstorming tour. In order to help the team coalesce into a unit, in order to simulate real competition under international rules&mdash;and in order to get them the hell out of southern Indiana in the summer&mdash;USA Basketball had arranged for a series of games against makeshift teams of NBA players. Like a summer concert tour, the circuit threaded its way through an assortment of cities, some (Minneapolis) more logical than others (Iowa City?).
Apart from offering an entertaining summer basketball exhibition, the games doubled as an exercise in patriotism. Knight had already stressed this aspect with his players. Time and again, he reminded them that they were playing as representatives of America, which, as the coach put it, was one of the great civilizations in world history. Knight also constantly reminded them of recent Olympic basketball history. Though 12 years had elapsed, Knight often invoked the gold-medal game in the 1972 Olympics, when the Russians &ldquo;won&rdquo; an atrociously officiated contest 51&ndash;50, the outcome so dubious and controversial that the American players never accepted their silver medals.
With the Soviet boycott of the 1984 Games, there would be no Cold War flashpoint or baked-in rival this time. Still, these were our boys&mdash;the same age as soldiers&mdash;going off to do battle in an international theater, representing their country and wearing uniforms emblazoned in red, white, and blue.
This patriotic strain was especially vivid in Indianapolis on this night. It was the Monday after Fourth of July weekend. And the unit was led by Knight, a man nicknamed the General, who had started his coaching tour of duty at West Point and fancied himself a military historian. The ragtag mix of NBA players forming the opposition were coaxed into interrupting their summer on the grounds that they were fulfilling a patriotic duty, serving as sparring partners for the American unit.
At the entrance to the Hoosier Dome, local Girl Scout troops handed out miniature American flags to the 67,596 fans who attended, at the time the largest crowd ever to watch a basketball game indoors. During the pregame ceremonies, Knight welcomed the crowd and then handed the stage over to none other than Ronald Reagan. The president had taped a message that played on the video board, declaring that Knight&rsquo;s collection of players was &ldquo;not just a team. They&rsquo;re the American team.&rdquo;
Amid all this patriotic (jingoistic?) fervor, few fans noticed a small interlude on the court. During the pregame warm-up, Michael Jordan, shod now in the Fastbreak model by Converse, the sponsor of the Olympic team, unspooled a series of jump shots. After one errant attempt, his ball squirted away from him, crossed the DMZ of half-court, and bounded into enemy territory, the opponent&rsquo;s side of the floor.
It found its way into the hands of Larry Bird. Fresh from winning the NBA title a few weeks earlier, Bird had, somewhat grudgingly, paused his off-season ritual&mdash;consisting mostly of beer drinking and fishing&mdash;to take part in this exhibition, a few hours&rsquo; drive from his famed hometown of French Lick, Indiana.
For Bird, though, there were no exhibition games. Only competitions. Jordan wore a sheepish, congenial My bad, Larry, smile as he came to retrieve his ball. Bird, the NBA&rsquo;s reigning MVP, was less congenial. Sneering dismissively, he kicked the ball over Jordan&rsquo;s head and back to the other end of the court, the indoor equivalent of Get off my lawn, kid. Jordan walked back, shaking his head, interpreting it as a bit of validation. He was already worthy of Larry Bird&rsquo;s mind games. See you in the NBA, pal.
That night, the U.S. women&rsquo;s basketball team served as something of a warm-up act. Led by Cheryl Miller&mdash;whose kid brother Reggie would be drafted by the Indiana Pacers three summers later and leave as the franchise&rsquo;s most decorated pro basketball player&mdash;the U.S. women cruised to a 97&ndash;54 win over a patchwork team of former college players. &ldquo;Not much to complain about,&rdquo; said the coach, Pat Summitt, who had turned 32 a few weeks before.
As for the main event, the men&rsquo;s game, Bird tricked Jordan into a pair of quick fouls and the NBA All-Stars&mdash;featuring most of Bird&rsquo;s Celtics teammates as well as the Detroit Pistons&rsquo; star guard Isiah Thomas, who had played for Knight at Indiana&mdash;took a 16&ndash;10 lead. But then the Olympians took over, benefiting from superior depth, cohesion, and ambition. They pulled away in the second half and won 97&ndash;82. Bird had 14 points. Jordan had 12. Seven months later, when Jordan next appeared at the Hoosier Dome, he and Bird would be on the same side of the court, teammates representing the Eastern Conference at the NBA All-Star Game.
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Apart from simulating battle, the barnstorming tour gave rise to a certain esprit de corps, a chemistry among the unit. Knight experimented with lineups and was intentionally vague and erratic about his rotation.
Players also experienced Knight&rsquo;s brutal, military-style authority. Within a few years, autocrats like Knight would be subject to the equivalent of court-martial&mdash;&ldquo;You can&rsquo;t handle the truth!&rdquo; we might have later said&mdash;for breaches of basic human decency. But in 1984, Knight&rsquo;s M.O. was still acceptable, perhaps especially heading into an international competition.
For Knight, basketball was never about missed shots or made shots. It was about manifestations of character. Were you tough and durable and courageous and unswerving in your convictions? Or did you play with what Knight perceived to be the twin curses of softness and indecision?
Some players recoiled from Knight&rsquo;s style. (That included Larry Bird, who, recruited by Knight in the mid-seventies, had gone home after a homesick month on campus in Bloomington and then transferred to Indiana State.) Others responded to it. Jordan was not merely unbothered by Knight; he warmed to his discipline and his combustible personality and saw value in both. It was all in service of winning. And what&rsquo;s wrong with the alpha acting like the alpha?
Patrick Ewing would later tell the story that one night he and Jordan began play-wrestling in the living quarters. Nothing malicious, just two bored and athletic kids fooling around. Though Jordan spotted Ewing six inches and perhaps 50 pounds, he got his man in a headlock. Ewing capitulated. Neither thought much of it, but the next day Ewing couldn&rsquo;t move his neck.
Worse, he had to tell Knight what had happened and that Jordan had been the culprit. &ldquo;Coach Knight was mad,&rdquo; Ewing recalled to the writer Jack McCallum in his excellent book Dream Team. &ldquo;But only at me. Michael? Nothing happened to him. Nothing ever happened to Michael.&rdquo;
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Which wasn&rsquo;t entirely true. Knight went after Jordan plenty. But sometimes it was to test Jordan&rsquo;s resolve. Other times it was to send a message: No one is above the law. (On these occasions, Knight would sometimes warn Jordan what was coming.)
Jordan&rsquo;s college coach, Dean Smith, was a strong authority figure who brooked no bullsh**. But this was at an entirely different level. Which was fine by Jordan. Asked&mdash;as he invariably was throughout the tour&mdash;to compare coaches, Jordan smiled and offered a winning line: &ldquo;The only different thing is the vocabulary. From Coach Smith I learned the four-corner offense. From Coach Knight I learned the four-letter word.&rdquo; (Wait for laughter.) &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve heard some of the words before that he&rsquo;s used, but never from a coach.&rdquo;
Referring to Knight by his first name, he continued, &ldquo;Bobby doesn&rsquo;t scare me. I&rsquo;m taller than him.&rdquo; (Wait for more laughter.) &ldquo;But I see what gets him mad, and I make sure I don&rsquo;t do it. He&rsquo;s taught us all a lot, and his way of getting a point across doesn&rsquo;t take the fun out of this. Now, if you ask me whether I&rsquo;d want to play for him for four years, I&rsquo;d have to think about it.&rdquo;
Jordan was more amused than anything else by Knight&rsquo;s eruptions. He often confided in [George] Raveling&mdash;who had known Knight since the late 1960s and counted him as a friend&mdash;jokingly referring to Knight as &ldquo;your boy.&rdquo; As in: You&rsquo;re never going to believe what your boy did today. Or: Check out what your boy called me this morning.
All bullies, though, need a target, and Wayman Tisdale, a silky lefty forward from Oklahoma, was a particular victim of Knight&rsquo;s. Confidants of Knight&rsquo;s explain that he didn&rsquo;t hold Tisdale&rsquo;s college coach, Billy Tubbs, in especially high esteem. Tubbs&rsquo;s teams played a high-scoring, defense-free style, absent of structure. (By received wisdom, Tubbs played comparably fast and loose with the NCAA rule book.) Knight was going to impose discipline and, by proxy, repudiate Tubbs and his slapdash approach to basketball.
During a practice before an exhibition in Greensboro, Knight stopped the session and demanded a black Magic Marker. He then bent down, wrote an X on the floor, and added a date. As Knight knelt on the court for this art project, the players exchanged quizzical looks. When the coach finished, he declared, &ldquo;I just wanted to mark the time and place that I first saw Wayman Tisdale take a charge.&rdquo; More than once, the General kicked Tisdale out of the gym, leaving the player in tears. Asked what he thought of Knight&rsquo;s methods, Tisdale would say, &ldquo;When I go back to Oklahoma, I&rsquo;m gonna find everyone I used to think was mean, and I&rsquo;m gonna hug &lsquo;em.&rdquo;&nbsp;
While it wasn&rsquo;t quite the Harlem Globetrotters vs. the Washington Generals, with scripted outcomes and storylines, everyone knew the rules of engagement for these exhibition games. The NBA players were expected to try hard, but not their hardest, and keep the games close. They were not supposed to win. So they didn&rsquo;t. But the games were often competitive, sometimes intensely so.
On July 12, the Olympians played an exhibition game in Milwaukee. Before the game, Tim Hallam, a young staffer in the Bulls&rsquo; public relations office, drove up from Chicago with a photographer. His task: get Michael Jordan to pose for a portrait photo in a Bulls uniform. Hallam introduced himself to Jordan for the first time and was impressed when the kid smiled, looked him in the eye, and seemed to grasp the exercise. Hey, a team needs to sell tickets. I&rsquo;m the new draft pick. This comes with the territory.
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But with tip-off looming, there was no time to set up proper lighting. So there, in the middle of the locker room in Milwaukee, surrounded by teammates, Jordan changed out of the Olympic uniform and into the Bulls uniform and sat for the damn photo. While he would later razz Hallam about this imposition on his time&mdash;this, the very first of countless requests the Bulls&rsquo; public relations staff would make over the years&mdash;on this night, Jordan could not have been more accommodating.
While Jordan was posing for the photo shoot, Knight was in the other locker room, encouraging two of the NBA stars, Mike Dunleavy and Doc Rivers, to knock his players around a lot. They obliged. So did their teammate, Mickey Johnson, of the Golden State Warriors, who took advantage of the tour&rsquo;s unlimited fouls policy, committing 13 infractions. But when the game turned from physical to violent, Knight reconsidered, screaming at the referees to get control of the game: &ldquo;Too much is at stake.&rdquo;
In the second half, Jordan went in for a breakaway dunk. Dunleavy swooped in, extended his right hand, and raked Jordan across the face. After thudding to the ground, Jordan popped up like a jack-in-the-box, glowering and looking to fight Dunleavy. By the time he was restrained by teammates, he was already cocking a fist. &ldquo;I didn&rsquo;t come out here to not play hard,&rdquo; Dunleavy said. &nbsp;(Seven summers later, Jordan would get his revenge, winning his first NBA title in 1991 as the Chicago Bulls defeated the Los Angeles Lakers, a team coached by&nbsp;.&nbsp;.&nbsp;. Mike Dunleavy.)
After the game in Milwaukee, Knight was still hot. He declared Charley Vacca, a college official, &ldquo;the most incompetent sonofabitch I&rsquo;ve seen referee. . . . What do you want me to do, sit on my ass and let a million-dollar player&rsquo;s career be ruined by some a**hole with a whistle?&rdquo;
Apart from a**holes with whistles, the tour was a smashing success that achieved its goal. Some games were blowouts, the team playing in harmony. Other games were close, and the Olympians were forced to show some mettle, scoring baskets and making critical stops on defense. But the Olympians played against the best and brightest in the NBA (Bird in Indianapolis; Magic Johnson in Minneapolis; Clyde Drexler in Iowa City; Alex English and Kiki Vandeweghe in Phoenix). In the end, the Olympians won all eight games; roles and responsibilities became more clear; collectively and individually, confidence swelled.
But the tour also did something else: it highlighted the lavish skills of Michael Jordan. The games foreshadowed just how seamlessly Jordan&rsquo;s game, his explosive athleticism, his position&mdash;for that matter, his disposition&mdash;would translate to the NBA.
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Jay Bilas had finished his sophomore year at Duke and played sporadically on the basketball team. He&rsquo;d harbored interests beyond basketball and that summer served as a production assistant for ABC for Olympic basketball telecasts. While most of his work came at the L.A. Games, Bilas was also assigned to work some of the exhibition games between the Olympians and the NBA players.
Having played against Jordan at the rival school less than half an hour away, Bilas had seen Jordan put up 20 points a game in the Atlantic Coast Conference. He was unsurprised when he attended a pregame practice in Minneapolis and it was abundantly obvious that Jordan was the best player on the team.
But then the game started. Jordan was competing against the likes of Magic Johnson, Kevin McHale, Isiah Thomas, and Mark Aguirre. &ldquo;He was still the best player&mdash;by far,&rdquo; says Bilas. &ldquo;It was pretty clear that there wasn&rsquo;t anybody in the NBA or internationally that could hang with him. Jordan did stuff where it was like Are you kidding me? And I saw him do it in college a little bit, but this was a different level. I remembered, as a kid, people used to say that when Mickey Mantle made contact, his bat made a different sound from everyone else&rsquo;s. It was like that. He was making moves and you were like It&rsquo;s just different. No one else is doing that.&rdquo;
Toward the end of the tour, the U.S. team played a collection of All-Stars in Phoenix. After Jordan dropped 27 points and the Olympians won their eighth-straight game, 84&ndash;72, the opposing coach was visibly slack-jawed. How good was Jordan? &ldquo;He&rsquo;s as gifted a player as any I&rsquo;ve ever seen play ball,&rdquo; responded Pat Riley, the Lakers&rsquo; coach&mdash;who was, bear in mind, just a few weeks removed from watching Larry Bird, Kevin McHale, Magic Johnson, James Worthy, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar duel for seven games in a classic series. &ldquo;What happened here and then through the Olympics will only make him better. I don&rsquo;t think he realizes how good he really is.&rdquo;
<a href="https://twitter.com/jon_wertheim" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Follow L. Jon Wertheim on Twitter: @jon_wertheim</a>
<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Glory-Days-Changed-Culture-Forever/dp/1328637247" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Buy this book on Amazon: Glory Days: The Summer of 1984 and the 90 Days That Changed Sports and Culture Forever</a>
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Jon Wertheim details the ascent of Michael Jordan, who was no longer a college player and not yet a pro, in the summer of 1984.

How the summer of 1984 foreshadowed Michael Jordan's NBA greatness

Elgin Baylor, the Lakers&rsquo; 11-time NBA All-Star who soared through the 1960s with a high-scoring style of basketball that became the model for the modern player, died Monday. He was 86.
The Lakers announced that Baylor died of natural causes in Los Angeles with his wife, Elaine, and daughter Krystal by his side.
With a silky-smooth jumper and fluid athleticism, Baylor played a major role in revolutionizing basketball from a ground-bound sport into an aerial show. He spent parts of 14 seasons with the Lakers in Minneapolis and Los Angeles during his Hall of Fame career, teaming with Jerry West throughout the &rsquo;60s in one of the most potent tandems in basketball history.
&ldquo;Elgin was THE superstar of his era &mdash; his many accolades speak to that,&rdquo; Lakers Governor Jeanie Buss said in a statement announcing Baylor's death.
Baylor&rsquo;s second career as a personnel executive with the woebegone Los Angeles Clippers was much less successful. He worked for the Clippers from 1986 until 2008, when he left the team with acrimony and an unsuccessful lawsuit against owner Donald Sterling and the NBA, alleging age and race discrimination.
The 6-foot-5 Baylor played in an era before significant television coverage of basketball, and little of his play was ever captured on film. His spectacular style is best remembered by those who saw it in person &mdash; including West, who once called him &ldquo;one of the most spectacular shooters the world has ever seen.&rdquo;
Baylor had an uncanny ability to hang in mid-air indefinitely, inventing shots along the way with his head bobbing. Years before Julius Erving and Michael Jordan became international superstars with their similarly acrobatic games, Baylor created the blueprint for the modern superstar.
Baylor soared above most of his contemporaries, but never won a championship or led the NBA in scoring largely because he played at the same time as centers Bill Russell, who won all the rings, and Wilt Chamberlain, who claimed all the scoring titles. Knee injuries hampered much of the second half of Baylor&rsquo;s career, although he remained a regular All-Star.
West and Baylor were the first pair in the long tradition of dynamic duos with the Lakers, followed by Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in the 1980s before Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O&rsquo;Neal won three more titles in the 2000s.
But Baylor&rsquo;s Lakers lost six times in the NBA Finals to the Boston Celtics and another time to the New York Knicks. Los Angeles won the 1971-72 title, but only after Baylor retired nine games into the season.
Baylor arrived in the NBA in 1958 as the No. 1 draft pick out of Seattle University. He immediately set new superlatives for individual scoring, with a 55-point game in his Rookie-of-the-Year season before scoring 64 on Nov. 8, 1959 &mdash; then the NBA single-game record, and the Lakers record for 45 years until Bryant broke it.
Baylor became the first NBA player to surpass 70 points with a 71-point game Dec. 11, 1960, against New York. Chamberlain set the record of 100 points in 1962.
Baylor averaged 38 points in the 1961-62 season despite doing active duty as an Army reservist. He scored 61 points in a playoff game against Boston in 1962, a record that would stand for 24 years until Jordan broke it.
Baylor averaged 27.4 points and 13.5 rebounds during his 14-year career. He scored a total of 23,149 points in 846 games, and was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in May 1977.
Elgin Gay Baylor was born in Washington, D.C. on Sept. 16, 1934. He was named after his father&rsquo;s favorite watch, an &ldquo;Elgin&rdquo; timepiece. Although he starred at two high schools, Baylor struggled academically and briefly dropped out, working in a furniture store and playing in local recreational leagues.
Baylor went to the College of Idaho because he was given a scholarship to play both basketball and football, but the school fired its basketball coach and cut several scholarships a year later. Baylor transferred to Seattle and played from 1956-58, averaging 31.3 points per game and leading the team to the 1958 NCAA championship game, where it lost to coach Adolph Rupp&rsquo;s Kentucky Wildcats.
The year before the Lakers persuaded Baylor to leave college a year early, the club was near bankruptcy after finishing 19-53, falling far since their glory years in the late &rsquo;40s and early &lsquo;50s in Minneapolis with center George Mikan.
Baylor transformed the franchise with his scoring and style. Minneapolis beat the Detroit Pistons and the defending champion St. Louis Hawks in the 1959 playoffs to make it to the NBA Finals, losing to the fledgling Celtics dynasty.
Baylor averaged 24.9 points, fourth in the league, and was third in rebounding with 15 a game. He was easily voted Rookie of the Year.
The Lakers moved west to Los Angeles in 1960, and Baylor became the centerpiece of their Hollywood revival. He averaged 34.8 points in the Lakers&rsquo; first season in Los Angeles, second in the league to Chamberlain.
Jerry West arrived from West Virginia in 1960, and they immediately clicked, averaging 69.1 combined points per game. Baylor played in only 48 games on weekend passes because his military service, but the Lakers still won the Western Conference by 11 games.
Baylor&rsquo;s 61-point performance against the Celtics in Game 5 of the finals put the Lakers ahead 3-2 in the series, but they lost to the Celtics in overtime in Game 7 &mdash; the pinnacle of the Lakers&rsquo; suffering at Boston&rsquo;s hands.
Frank Selvy missed a 10-foot jumper that would have won the game in regulation. In film of that moment, Baylor appears poised to get Selvy&rsquo;s rebound, then disappears from the screen. Baylor contended he was pushed out of bounds by Boston&rsquo;s Sam Jones.
&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve always felt that was our championship,&rdquo; Baylor told the Riverside Press-Enterprise in 2000.
He never got closer to a ring.
The following season Baylor became the first to finish in the NBA&rsquo;s top five in four different statistical categories: scoring, rebounding, assists and free-throw percentage. The Lakers reached the finals again &mdash; and lost to the Celtics again.
Knee problems that began in the 1963-64 season started a slow decline for Baylor. He never averaged more than 30 points a season again, though he remained a competent scorer.
Baylor played his last full season in 1968-69, and suited up only sporadically until retiring at 37 in the fall of 1971.
Baylor&rsquo;s post-playing career never lived up to the magic of his on-court skills.
The expansion New Orleans Jazz hired him as an assistant coach for their debut season in 1974, and he eventually replaced Butch van Breda Kolff as coach during the 1976-77 season, going 86-135 in parts of three seasons. Pete Maravich&rsquo;s Jazz never made the playoffs, and Baylor resigned after the 1978-79 season.
In April 1986, the Clippers hired Baylor as their vice president for basketball operations. The Clippers made the playoffs in 1992 and 1993, but the franchise became the modern model of sports ineptitude for most of his tenure with poor drafting, indifferent fans and skinflint financial dealings.
Sterling largely was blamed for the franchise&rsquo;s ineptitude, while Baylor received both admiration for his tenacity and ricidule for his inability to fix the Clippers&rsquo; woes.
Their 22-year relationship ended abruptly in October 2008 when the club put coach Mike Dunleavy in charge of personnel decisions.
Baylor, then 74, filed a $2 million lawsuit against the Clippers, Sterling and the NBA in February 2009, alleging he was fired because of his age and race. Baylor also said the Clippers grossly underpaid him.
The Clippers denied the allegations and said Baylor had resigned voluntarily. A Los Angeles County jury unanimously ruled in the Clippers&rsquo; favor in March 2011, refusing to award any damages.
Besides his wife and daughter, Baylor is survived by a son and daughter, Alan and Alison, from a previous marriage, and sister Gladys Baylor Barrett.
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Elgin Baylor: Forever part of our Lakers Family. <a href="https://t.co/zcRhVUSSmx">pic.twitter.com/zcRhVUSSmx</a>
&mdash; Los Angeles Lakers (@Lakers) <a href="https://twitter.com/Lakers/status/1374064950767804422?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 22, 2021</a></blockquote>

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___
Baylor played 14 seasons in the NBA, all with the Lakers -- both in Minneapolis and Los Angeles -- making the All-Star Game 11 times and the All-NBA team 10 times. In his career he averaged 27.4 points per game and 13.5 rebounds. He was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1977.
<a href="http://basketballnews.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-stringify-link="http://BasketballNews.com" data-sk="tooltip_parent" aria-describedby="sk-tooltip-1849">BasketballNews.com</a> extends its deepest sympathies and condolences to Baylor's loved ones at this difficult time.

Baylor died from natural causes, according to the Lakers.

Lakers' legend Elgin Baylor passes away at 86

After his former teammate Juwan Howard was named the Big Ten Coach of the Year, Chris Webber texted me when I asked him for a quote for an article about him.
"I&rsquo;m happy for Juwan. He earned it! He is a great leader! He doesn&rsquo;t even have to address all the critics that doubted his success because I will.... Haaaaa told you soooo. Lol. I&rsquo;m so damn proud."
By leading his Michigan Wolverines to a 19-3 record as the No. 4 team in the nation, Howard has stuck it to the critics that Chris was referring to. Let's go back to May 2019, when his alma mater introduced him as the university's next men's basketball head coach.
It was a beautiful moment seeing the Fab Five member and 19-year NBA super-vet sitting there with his entire family by his side and overcome with emotion, and watching him fighting back the tears as he held up his same No. 25 jersey and hugged Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel.
It was enough to plug at the heart strings of Howard and Michigan fans, but anybody with eyes could see how much this meant to him. This wasn&rsquo;t simply someone being excited and elated to take the reins of a team as the head coach, this was special to Howard. It was so special that, as he took the podium, he needed almost a full minute to compose himself before he uttered words.
&ldquo;I said I wasn&rsquo;t going to cry...I guess that happens when you&rsquo;re excited about something so special to you," said an emotional Howard.
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As amazing and as memorable of a moment that it was, however, not everyone shared in that excitement. It didn't take long for the media and pundits to foolishly come after Howard's credibility as a head coach.
&ldquo;In essence, U-M is replacing a great coach who was never an assistant coach with someone who has never been a head coach, which raises all kinds of concerns and question marks,&rdquo; <a href="https://www.freep.com/story/sports/columnists/jeff-seidel/2019/05/22/michigan-basketball-juwan-howard-concern/3767344002/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">wrote Jeff Seidel of the Detroit Free Press.</a> &ldquo;...Howard has never been a head coach -- Coaching the Heat's Summer League team doesn&rsquo;t count. And he has no college coaching experience.
&ldquo;...We don&rsquo;t know if Howard will be able to push the right buttons or draw up the right plays or manage the clock or make the right adjustments in a game. And we don&rsquo;t know know if he will be able to be an effective recruiter.&rdquo;
MLive's Andrew Kahn <a href="https://www.freep.com/story/sports/columnists/jeff-seidel/2019/05/22/michigan-basketball-juwan-howard-concern/3767344002/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">questioned the move</a>. There were articles saying at the time that Howard's hire &ldquo;raises all kinds of concerns and question marks," and considered the decision &ldquo;a huge risk.&rdquo; Mike Valenti, a radio host on 97.1 The Ticket, went further with his disrespect: &ldquo;Hiring Juwan Howard is nothing more than a PR stunt and an admission you couldn&rsquo;t get a quality candidate," <a href="https://www.radio.com/971theticket/articles/mike-valenti-juwan-howard-hire-most-michigan-thing-ever" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Valenti said</a>.
This is still happening now, too. It is well known that Doug Gottileb of FOX Sports thrives to criticize. It&rsquo;s kind of his schtick. Just look at this tweet from last month.
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Michigan made a great hire with Jawun Howard, Jawun made a great hires with Phil Martelli, Saddi Washington and Howard Eisley. Hire people who know what you don&rsquo;t know.
&mdash; Doug Gottlieb (@GottliebShow) <a href="https://twitter.com/GottliebShow/status/1361044426697502723?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 14, 2021</a></blockquote>

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The disrespect was evident of not only misspelling Juwan&rsquo;s name in his tweet, but the backhanded compliment in suggesting that Howard doesn&rsquo;t know what he&rsquo;s doing or isn&rsquo;t qualified to be a head coach so he needs people around him that do.&nbsp;
Well, Howard proved each and every one of them wrong. Not only did Howard win Big Ten Coach of the Year in 2021, but he also was named Sporting News' COY.
On Sunday afternoon, SN's Mike Decoursy <a href="https://www.sportingnews.com/us/ncaa-basketball/news/juwan-howard-michigan-coach-of-the-year/1tb73ththc6h41piqjya53s4y5" target="_blank" rel="noopener">went into detail on former-players-turned-coaches</a> and tied it into the initial reaction of Howard's hire two years ago.
&ldquo;There was cause to be skeptical of whether Howard was the ideal choice," Decoursy wrote. "The immediate period before he was hired saw a series of NBA alum cycle through the college game with moderate to no success. Avery Johnson lasted four seasons at Alabama and finished just 13 games over .500, with one NCAA Tournament appearance. Chris Mullin spent just as long at St. John&rsquo;s and was 14 games short of breaking even. From 2016 through 2019, Mike Dunleavy Sr. compiled a .258 winning percentage at Tulane. With his fourth season at Georgetown soon to end, Patrick Ewing is exactly a .500 coach.
"All of these men made serious contributions to the greatest basketball competition on the planet, but each found conquering the college game elusive. Working in the college game is a different deal; one is as much a general manager, a salesperson, a fundraiser and a mentor as a coach. The NBA has others to fill those roles, leaving the people in charge of coaching to do only that. Handling that wide variety of duties appears to be one reason those who attempt to make the jump from the pros so often fail. But Howard immediately demonstrated he was different.&rdquo;
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Asked about the critics during a press conference in Feb. 17, Howard admitted that <a href="https://wolverineswire.usatoday.com/2021/02/17/michigan-basketball-juwan-howard-head-coach-doubters/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">he's heard the doubters from day one</a>.
"I&rsquo;m not gonna sit here like I don&rsquo;t hear the noise before I got hired. And also, still to this day, I hear the backhanded compliments," Howard said. Am I competitive? Of course I am! But I&rsquo;m also about improving and having the growth mindset of how I can get better to be the best version of myself to help prepare this team, and more importantly to represent this fine institution the best way possible. That&rsquo;s my No. 1 goal. That&rsquo;s what drives me. That&rsquo;s what really excites me.&rdquo;
&ldquo;And also -- yeah, I wake up in the middle of the night thinking about plays, thinking about defensive situations, thinking about how I can get better, how I can help prepare the team. &nbsp;That&rsquo;s how I&rsquo;m wired. I wouldn&rsquo;t have been able to last 19 years in the NBA if I didn&rsquo;t have a certain edge about me. To get back into coaching, for six years as an assistant coach, the Miami Heat staff and also I took upon myself to prepare myself to become a head coach someday. I worked at this. And I&rsquo;m gonna continue to keep working. I love it.&rdquo;
As a result of that love and dedication, Howard&rsquo;s feisty Wolverines are in contention for a national championship as we enter the NCAA tourney next week. He&rsquo;s out-recruiting Kentucky's John Calipari and Duke's Mike Krzyzewski, two of the top coaches in college hoops. Michigan's freshman center, Hunter Dickinson, exceeded expectations and won Big Ten Freshman Of The Year,
The Wolverines are a conference champion, a presumptive No. 1 seed for the NCAA Tournament and a highly-favored Final Four lock. As Chris Webber told me, &ldquo;He doesn&rsquo;t have to address all of the critics that doubted his success."
And with that success, Juwan Howard shut all of the critics up.

By leading his Michigan Wolverines to a 19-3 record as the No. 4 team in the nation, Juwan Howard has stuck it to his doubters.

Mike