| Friday, November 26
By Jeffrey Denberg
Special to ESPN.com |
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Some guys are bad losers. My colleague and Western Conference correspondent Mike Monroe is a bad winner.
Almost a month into the season and the Western Conference is threatening to kick the NBA East all the way across the Atlantic Time Zone. Monroe cackles when he's one-up and right now he sounds like the only rooster in a big hen house.
|  | | Rasheed Wallace and the Blazers have been beating up East teams. |
You can look it up: Through Monday's games, the six best teams in the West (excluding Sacramento, which has not played an Eastern team) are 16-4 against their Eastern Conference brethren. This includes Portland at 5-0 and San Antonio at 4-1.
Western clubs are too deep, too quick, too good.
Since Michael Jordan's retirement many of us have suspected that the East would slip into an abyss. Well, I think the Earth opened this side of the Mississippi.
The best club in the East today is Miami, and the way the Blazers handled the Heat on the road tells us something unpalatable: The pendulum swung left when the Spurs bopped the Knicks last June, and it ain't coming back.
There are two quick explanations for the sharp decline in Eastern fortunes.
First, remember that the West had a long run of top draft picks throughout the late '80s and '90s.
Second, Steve Smith, Scottie Pippen, Shaquille O'Neal and Penny Hardaway were all top guys in the East.
At least the Easties saved a little face when Toronto went into L.A. and slugged the Lakers. Butch Carter made an interesting little change, replacing Alvin Williams with Dee Brown at the point and the Raptors got off to a 23-9 start.
The game represented yet another testament to the skills and heart of last year's top rookie, Vince Carter. The kid went for 34 points and 13 rebounds even though Shaquille O'Neal bounced him on the floor like a ball. Carter couldn't move for several minutes. "I just wanted to make sure everything was intact," he said. "My fingers were tingling."
There are other explanations.
Stephon Marbury and Allen Iverson going solo. No wonder things are tough.
Neither Marbury nor Iverson has patience with less-skilled teammates. Both are brilliant talents, but they don't want to be point guards and their teams suffer.
They recall scouting maven Marty Blake's story about Myron Brown of Slippery Rock. At the Portsmouth Invitational a few years ago, Blake told Brown that the scouts wanted to see him move the ball, distribute to his teammates. "Do that and you've got a job in the NBA, son."
Brown pondered that, then shook his head, said, "I can't do that, Marty. I'm a shooting point."
Sam Cassell says there are two true point guards in the league and he's not one of them. "(John) Stockton and (Jason) Kidd. everyone else has the mentality now that they can score. I think the point guard has disappeared right now. I don't want to be considered a point guard. I want to be considered a guard."
Rod Strickland goes nolo.
For a variety of reasons, Strickland doesn't practice, and Gar Heard won't start him until he works in the mornings and shows up on time.
However, suggestions the Wizards trade Strickland or injured teammate Mitch Richmond are ridiculous. All they can get for Strickland are lesser players costing almost as much money. As for Richmond, he's a base-year player. All you need to know about this is the Wizards can only take back a fraction of his salary. That makes it impossible for any team over the cap to do business. Teams under the cap are saving their dollars for next summer.
The latest victim of bad management in Washington, Heard talks a good game. Given a fair chance, he could be successful. But the Wizards will never represent a fair chance as long as Abe Pollin and Wes Unseld run the operation.
Around the league
Coaches are very unhappy with NBA referees in the early season. It goes beyond the rules. It's not having five solid veteran referees at work due to injury (Bob Delaney) and suspension (Derrick Stafford, Ed Rush).
"No consistency and some really bad crews," one coach said. "The combinations are terrible. You have three-man crews that lack a qualified crew chief. My guys have questions and they can't get answers."
Refs are frazzled and working assignments they can't handle. If you've seen Tommy Nunez in action you know what I'm talking about.
Then there is Bennett Salvatore, who reached his level of competence long ago. Saturday night in Atlanta, Salvatore went out of his way to embarrass and intimidate Doc Rivers in his first coaching assignment in his first NBA city.
A minute into the game Rivers was at the 10-second line howling about a bad call against his Michael Doleac.
"Ben, Ben, that's his spot," Rivers hollered after Doleac was knocked aside like a rag doll by Dikembe Mutombo.
"No, it's not his spot," Salvatore screamed back. "And that's the last time you'll walk up to half court."
There were more than 14,000 in the building. Salvatore made sure they all heard him.
Let's clear up a point. Anything you read about Dikembe Mutombo leaving Atlanta this season is simply false. Mutombo had an opt-out last summer. He declined to exercise it because he makes in excess of $28 million the final two years of his contract. Mutombo doesn't want to be traded. The Hawks don't want to trade him. It would take nothing less than another All-Star center to change that.
The NBA All-Star concept has become silly. The league uses a celebrity media to make up its ballots and that's how you omit Jamal Mashburn but include Orlando's Matt Harpring and Indiana's Jonathan Bender on the ballot. Bender was hurt before the season and it was common knowledge Larry Bird would not give him a chance to play this season. Harpring was hurt before the season and finally succumbed to a torn tendon in his ankle.
If the league wanted the best candidates on its ballot, it would use a panel of league scouts. They see everything and know more than anyone else.
Jeffrey Denberg, who covers the NBA for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, is a regular contributor to ESPN.com. |  |
NBA West: Rockets need to go East
