Nets Are Scorching

New story: Bynum tells ESPNLA.com he will not play vs NJN.

— Dave McMenamin (@mcten) April 3, 2012

According to McMenamin, Bynum was also fined by the team for “numerous infractions,” including skipping a meeting with Lakers general manager Mitch Kupchak.

This comes as welcome news to the Nets, also down their star center and his backup. However, the Lakers still boast Pau Gasol on the block, a legitimate 7-footer with no New Jersey counterpart. Hopefully Kobe doesn’t allow Gasol too many touches tonight.

The Nets announced today that small forward Gerald Green has been signed through the 2011-12 season, after averaging 11.7 points per game on 52% shooting in 11 games. There was no word on Green’s status for next season.

Along with the acrobatics, Green is shooting 56% on midrange jumpers from 15 feet and beyond.

NJ source on why they traded their pick to POR Top 3 protected:Only 3 players they loved: Anthony Davis, MKG and Thomas Robinson.

— Chad Ford (@chadfordinsider) March 16, 2012

And, via NetsDaily:

“This trade was really done to get us a small forward,” King said, “a former All-Star, somebody to give us some great defense, versatility, someone to play hard …” As for protecting the pick only #1 through #3, King said following conversations with their scouts, the team did not see any immediate-impact players beyond their projected top three in next year’s draft.

Two things here. Firstly, Billy King apparently believes that there are only three impact players in this draft. Discounting the widespread belief that there are at least a dozen potentially great players in this draft that’s lauded as one of the deepest in years, King’s suggesting that his scouting’s done for the year and they already have their list set. As we all know, nothing changes for prospects during March Madness, pre-draft interviews, or the Draft Combine. Secondly, Billy King seemingly believes that everyone’s top three looks identical to his, and that it’s unfathomable that he could get MKG (who’s flown up draft boards) or Thomas Robinson (who could easily fall to mid-lottery) outside of the top 3.

More thoughts on the latest transactions later today.

As of this moment, Dwight Howard is still a member of the Orlando Magic. He stated tonight that he’s interested in playing out the season as a member of the Orlando Magic. He’s contractually obligated to the Orlando organization, and will continue to be until they either trade him or his contract runs up.

But, that didn’t stop the league from, earlier tonight, putting up “Dwight Howard Gametime” t-shirts on its official league website, with, um, some other team on it:

(h/t @hsquad71)

As Mike Wallace says:

Great line from Magic press room. League should fine itself for tampering for posting Dwight Nets shirt at NBA store.

— Michael Wallace (@WallaceNBA_ESPN) March 14, 2012

The link has since been taken down, though a quick Google search shows that there was once a link that led to the item with the name “adidas Dwight Howard Gametime T-Shirt – NBAStore.com,” and a tagline of “Score adidas Dwight Howard Gametime T-Shirt – The player’s number is subject to change, and the T-shirt will not ship until the official number is issued.”

Now, I, like most able-minded Nets fans, am excited at the possibility of Dwight Howard as a member of the New Jersey Brooklyn Nets, for reasons I hope are quite clear. But my excitement at this possibility gets quite tempered when the “coveting thy neighbor’s goods” trait slides into NBA Store territory.

The trade deadline is 3 P.M. (EST) Thursday.

MarShon “Martian” (ask his mom about it – seriously…word to mother) Brooks has a new website (!) and it’s probably one of the coolest, cleanest sites that you might find of any of the league players, let alone of a layperson or web professional. Quite simply, it’s all about MarShon doin’ work.

Upon the visit, you’ll notice that the layout space of MarShonBrooks.com is wide and spacious, downright artsy in scope and space. Widescreen page layouts, hi-res photos of him scoring on every page, and generally MarShonBrooks.com looks like something that’s owned explicitly by its namesake’s mark of identity. He’s all over the place without it looking tacky. It really does put the “home” in homepage.

I love his stylized logo of his first and last name initials; the M & B kind of remind me of a font that Eddie Murphy and Robin Givens would’ve designed in the movie “Boomerang.”

You can flip through seven main pages of his website: the M-insignia’d home page, the Bio, the News, Community, the Photos, the Videos, and the image Downloads. Each page caters to the clean, distinct likeness of Mr. Brooks, without MarShon at all coming across as a ham; it’s like you’re walking through his virtual upscale apartment (that he maybe owns in real life??).

One thing that I found interesting, and thus, has made me appreciate Mr. Brooks a bit more, is that though he was first born and lived in New Jersey in the first few years of his life (he’s a bit of a hometown kid for the Nets, it seems), he actually was raised in Atlanta and attended school in a suburb of Atlanta (Tucker); it’s significant to me, personally, because not even two years ago I lived in Atlanta, and it’s somewhat of a second home to me geographically.

(Very good, MarShon…)

In all, check out MarShonBrooks.com and see what he’s about there. It’s not a waste of time, and actually, it’s a visual sweetness for the eyes with its motion and penchant for color (there’s no dead white space anywhere and not blacked out in the background, which is fairly common for athlete websites for some nebulous reason).

Enjoy yourself.

“These weren’t just any shoes…these were NIKES.”
–Richard Thomas, “Chappelle’s Show”

It hasn’t been often within the past three or four years that a New Jersey Nets player has gotten much love from anyone throughout the league. Save for Devin Harris and Vince Carter’s team-up in 2008-2009 (in Harris’ lone All-Star campaign), the Nets are lackluster in gaining any kind of attention, let alone getting their own special PE (or player exclusive) shoe.

Enter Deron Williams.

A longtime endorser of the Swoosh since his Utah Jazz days and a bona-fide Nike player since his college days with Illinois — making Williams a Nike affiliate since 2002 — the Swoosh decided to extend his extensive PE collection over to colorways that favor the Nets’ own hue, which are red, white, navy blue, and silver gray. Better is the fact that the shoe that Williams wears is arguably the best basketball shoe on the market. Even better is that his shoe is available to the public.

Credit and thanks to the good folks at Sole Collector and Eastbay for the link and accompanying photos. Read more…

Eddy Rivera of Magic Basketball is a pretty cool guy. One of the benefits of being a cool guy is talking to NBA players at All-Star Weekend about what their favorite basketball movies are.

Most players gave some standard, expected answers: He Got Game, Above The Rim (both mentioned by current Net Anthony Morrow), Space Jam, Eddy, etc. But Dwight Howard said something a little different, a movie no other player mentioned.

Check out Magic Basketball to find out his answer.