Greg Oden risks life and limb!

Well, that's the impression I get when I read some of the recent news articles.

If you haven't seen the news, apparently Greg Oden decided to participate in a few games of pick-up basketball at his local fitness facility. Oops. Apparently that was a terrible thing to do.

The Blazer's weren't too happy about their recovering big man playing pick-up basketball.

Look, I understand that Oden's coming back from an injury and that the Blazers have a lot of money invested in him. On the other hand, from reading the reports it doesn't sound like he was engaging in any running or jumping beyond what he was actually cleared to do. The problem appears to be that he was doing it with "non-professionals."

Sorry, but I can't get too worked up about it. It doesn't sound like he was playing with players good enough to make him really exert himself. It sounds more like he was playing with a bunch of people like me-- decent high school level players, but nothing much beyond that level. In other words, they were excited to be on the same court as him, knew they were out-classed, and most likely were just enjoying the experience. Oden probably didn't get much beyond jogging and making some easy (for him!) dunks.

The summer after Rasheed Wallace graduated from high school, he spent a day at the swim club my family belonged to. He was on his way to UNC, and I'm pretty sure he had been told not to risk injury playing pick-up games with random people. Well, you know what? He played some basketball, some volleyball, and even a little tennis. I wasn't there for the basketball, but from all accounts he didn't really need to exert himself at all to be by far the best player on the court (not to mention the tallest player by a foot). If that's all that Greg Oden was doing, then he's just as likely to get hurt walking around his house (or getting up from the couch, as seems to have been the cause of his original injury) as by playing basketball.

I think everyone needs to just relax.

[I believe that commenter Louis played basketball with Rasheed that day, so hopefully he can add some details in the comments.]

[Late Update- 4/14/08- Just came across this CNNSI.com article that includes Oden's description of his pick-up basketball excursion, for what it's worth:

"I just wanted to get out there, I haven't been out there in so long,'' Oden said. "But the thing was, it wasn't as deep as people made it to be. It was a jog, a couple of jump shots, maybe one or two dunks. It wasn't that big of a deal. At least not to me.''

Am I going to jinx the Sixers?

The Sixers are doing so well recently that want to comment on it, but I'm afraid that if I start posting regularly again I'll jinx them.

Because, of course, my blog holds ultimate sway over how they do...

Much to Louis' Chagrin...

....after tonight's victory, the Sixers currently are holding down the eastern conference's final playoff spot. And by point differential, they're the sixth best team in the conference (these are per game, rather than per possession numbers, but good enough for this post). Granted, I think the Cavaliers' point differential is artificially low because of the games that Lebron missed with injury, but it still speaks well to the Sixers chances to make the playoffs.

That makes me happy, even if it doesn't make anyone other Sixers fan happy.

What would your All-star Weekend look like?

TrueHoop today points us to this blog entry by the president of the D-League. In it, Dan Reed (the D-league president) talks about the introduction of H-O-R-S-E to the D-League All-star weekend, and more generally talks about the D-League's role in trying out new things for the NBA. He asked people to send in ideas for all-star weekend.

So that got me thinking. What would I want to see? Off the top of my head, I can think of two competitions I'd like to see.

1. An NBA Jam style full-court two on two competition. Maybe play the games to 50 by twos and threes (but with a 20 minute cap). Not sure if it could be played on a full court-- maybe a 3/4 size court would be better. Set it up like a tournament so that there's a steady stream of games.

2. A half-court 1 v 1 tournament. You'd need to play with the rules in some way to try and not give too big of an advantage to either smalls or bigs, but I think the odd match-ups would actually be the most interesting part. I'm thinking an 8 second shot-clock, need to take the ball back, and one "teammate" whose only role is to pass the ball in so that big men don't need to dribble from the top of the key. And have it reffed-- award foul shots and allow people to foul out.

I'd be interested in watching these games. Think these events would be interesting? How about other ideas? Share them in the comments!

A (very) belated link- self-promotion edition

I find it amazing that for a number of months I was able to put a post up just about every day. Now, ever since I went onto my (very) sporadic posting schedule, I wonder how I ever had the time in my schedule to put up all those posts. I'm even more impressed now with the people who blog every day (while also maintaining a full-time job) than I was before.

That's all a long-winded way of saying that I've had a few links that I've been meaning to post for awhile, but somehow haven't gotten around to. At this point, they're pretty old, but I'll still give you two.

• About a month ago, Lebron James got pulled over for going 100 mph on the highway. I thought Henry (from TrueHoop) was a little flippant about it, and I wrote him with the reasons that I didn't think a 100 mph ticket was really similar to your run of the mill 75 mph speeding ticket. He was kind enough to add parts of my email to his post. (It's the fourth bullet from the bottom. I told you this post was going to be self-promotional.) He did make a point in his email response to me with which I agree: while what Lebron did was wrong, it probably wasn't deserving of the media storm that followed it--especially when you consider all of the other types of more socially destructive behavior by athletes that doesn't get any coverage.

• And while we're on the subject of old links from TrueHoop, I thought this paragraph from a post that Henry linked to by a player who signed with the Golden State Warriors was fascinating:

One thing that shocked me was during a timeout Coach Nelson doesn't say nothing. He just sits there and rubs his head and will occasionally draw up a play every now and then. When you have been in the league as long as he has, and accomplished the things he has at a high level, you shouldn't have to. I asked one of the players "why he doesn't talk during timeouts?" They said he just doesn't. They were like "if that shocks you about this team, then you are in for a bunch more surprises and weird things."

Yes, losing to the Knicks is bad...

As Louis points out in the comments to my last post, the Sixers recently lost to the Knicks.

Not so good.

And, more to the point, the loss to the Knicks didn't happen in isolation. After starting out the season doing quite well on defense, the Sixers have regressed badly. In the meantime, the offense has been consistently bad. I've generally been more bullish on the Sixers' chances this year than most of the experts (and Louis), but certainly their recent play hasn't done much to support my optimism.

Still, and you knew I needed to find some piece of information that meant my early season optimism hadn't been completely misplaced, as of today John Hollinger's automated power rankings have the Sixers ranked 22nd, coming in as the 11th ranked Eastern Conference team. Plus, based on the standings, the Sixers are still only 2 games out of the playoffs. While they've been very bad, the Sixers are still very much in the thick of the playoff race.

So talk of tanking might still be a bit premature...although maybe not for much longer!

Do we really need to play the Raptors again?

The Sixers just finished playing the Raptors for the third time this year. And for the third time this year, the Raptors carved up the Sixers defense.

The Sixers have been an above average team on defense this year (they started out the season very strong, but they haven't been quite as good recently), but not against the Raptors. In the three games against the Raptors, the Sixers have posted defensive efficiency ratings of 113.5, 112.7, and now 118.5 (I think that NBA.com indicates that league average is around 107). Ouch.
What exactly does Toronto do that well against us? Primarily, they shoot it well. Their turnover rate has varied from good to bad in the three games (11.8%, 17.2%, 14.1%) and so has their offensive rebound rate (20.5%, 32.5%, 20.0%). Shooting, however, has not been a problem. They've hit up the Sixers with true shooting percentages of 58.6, 58.2, and 64.1 in tonight's game. Remember-- last year the league average TS% was 54.2%.

Just think-- the Raptors are 15-17 against the rest of the league, but 3-0 against the Sixers. I bet they're much more excited to play the Sixers again in ten days then we are about playing them...