Category: NBA (Page 487 of 595)

The Lakers are off to a great start this season, but the early word on Andrew Bynum’s knee injury is that he’s going to miss eight weeks. It looks like a dislocated kneecap, which won’t require surgery but will require a lot of rest.

The team has won six straight and is 25-11, which puts them just a half game behind the Suns in the Pacific. They play in Seattle tonight and then they have the Suns, Nuggets, Spurs, Mavs and Cavs over the next two weeks. Then, after a home game against the Knicks, they play 12 of the next 13 games on the road, so if the team struggles without Bynum, things could get ugly very quickly.

In the 25 games that Bynum started, he averaged 14.6 points and 10.7 rebounds, and shot an eye-popping 65.6% from the field. During the team’s six-game win streak, he averaged 17.3 points, 12.2 rebounds and 2.3 blocks, which are borderline All-Star numbers.

Kwame Brown will likely be the main guy to try to fill Bynum’s shoes, and while he’s a decent defensive center, he just doesn’t have Bynum’s feel on offense.

If the Lakers go into a major slide, Kobe may not stay quiet on those trade demands he made last summer, though you’d think that Bynum’s play would have Bryant feeling pretty good about the Lakers’ short-term future.

…but not this good.

Boston is 29-3 and is on pace to finish the season 74-8, which would break the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls record of 72 wins. They’re getting outstanding play from their Big Three. Paul Pierce is averaging 21.5 points, 5.7 rebounds and 5.0 assists. Kevin Garnett is posting 19.1 points, 10.1 boards and 3.6 assists a game. Finally, Ray Allen is pitching in with 18.0 points, 4.0 rebounds and 3.1 assists to round out the dangerous trio.

But the Celtics aren’t just about offense. The team allows the fewest points in the league (87.3), and is also first in FG% allowed (.414) and 3P% allowed (.312).

Keep an eye on how Doc Rivers is using each of his stars. He isn’t using the Spurs’ model. When all three are healthy, it’s not often that the Spurs have fewer than two of their three stars on the court at any given time. There are long stretches in Celtics games when Garnett and Pierce (or Allen) are on the bench. It’s clear that he’s trying to develop his bench, and it hasn’t hurt the C’s yet, so it appears to be a successful strategy. Once the playoffs arrive, it will be interesting to see if he changes his rotation to ensure that at least two of his three stars are on the court at any given time.

So what are the chances of the C’s breaking the Bulls’ record? I’d say they are just so-so. Although they are playing great, they haven’t played the three best teams in the West – San Antonio, Dallas and Phoenix – so those should be six tough games right there. They’ve also stayed relatively injury-free, as Ray Allen is the only member of the Big Three that has missed any time (two games) due to injury.

To break the record, they need to continue to defend the way they are (not an easy task) and stay injury-free (which is even more difficult). That said, they definitely have a shot.

It’s nice that the East is relevant again.

Don’t look now, but the Greg Oden-less Portland Trailblazers are one of the hottest teams in the NBA. Though their 13-game winning streak ended last night against the Jazz, the streak contained several nice wins: Utah (twice), Golden State, Toronto, New Orleans and Denver.

Brandon Roy is playing at an All-Star level, averaging 19.2 points, 5.6 assists and 4.6 rebounds per game. LaMarcus Aldridge is chipping in with 17.5 points and 7.4 rebounds. After that, the team has six players averaging 7.3 points per game or more, so the Blazers are winning utilizing a team concept.

If Oden is as good as advertised, the Blazers are going to be very good for a very long time.