Dwayne Bacon's high 5 scorers of all time: 'Michael Jordan, Kevin Durant, Kobe Bryant, James Harden and Kyrie Irving'

As an illustration, with out both Paul George or Kawhi Leonard to play with anymore,2 James Harden has gone from a close to career-low utilization of 20.6% final 12 months to 31.8% (his highest since 2019-20) this 12 months. No participant has seen a bigger bump in offensive accountability up to now. However now that he’s gone again to being The System, Harden has a career-low 103 offensive ranking — with a really poor 26.8 3P%, which ought to most likely rebound some, but in addition uncharacteristically mortal charges of turnovers, drawing fouls and even trying 3s. -via Neil Paine’s Substack / November 5, 2024

Legislation Murray: Requested James Harden about what Clippers have to give attention to for tonight vs Suns Harden mentioned “For us, I feel it’s the identical sport plan each sport” Targeted on transition protection and defensive rebounding pic.x.com/cCu75dccJs -via Twitter @LawMurrayTheNU / October 31, 2024

Shams Charania: Sources: Forged for season two of Netflix’s NBA documentary collection Beginning 5: Kevin Durant, James Harden, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Jaylen Brown, Tyrese Haliburton. 🍿🍿🍿 -via x.com / October 29, 2024

Duane Rankin: “They will critique what we do. We wish to critique as properly.” Kevin Durant on relationship with media as he’s had back-and-forth with Stephen A. Smith. #Suns pic.x.com/TrARQ3azz5 -via Twitter @DuaneRankin / November 5, 2024

“Respectfully, Kevin Durant, might you cease mendacity, please? I’ve been an NBA reporter and I used to be a columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer as properly,” he mentioned. “Kevin Durant has seen me within the locker room when he was at Oklahoma Metropolis. He has seen me within the locker room when he was at Golden State. He has definitely seen me at video games all through his profession. However sadly for him, I don’t must be at shootaround and I don’t must be within the postgame locker room. I occur to have a success present that’s been No. 1 for 12 years. I’ve different issues to do with my time. I’m going to video games on a regular basis. I’m not a beat author anymore. So let’s get that out the way in which.” -via Terrible Asserting / November 4, 2024

By no means one to cover from a confrontation, Smith carved roughly 4 minutes out of Monday’s episode of First Take to reply. And what adopted was a virtuoso sports activities discuss tv efficiency wherein the 57-year-old bounced between showering Durant with reward and insulting him. “I bought unhealthy information for Kevin Durant: If you happen to’re anticipating me to reciprocate with that type of pettiness and childishness, it’s not gonna occur,” Smith started. “Kevin Durant is likely one of the biggest gamers to have ever performed this sport. He’s a future Corridor of Famer. He’s a two-time champion and two time Finals MVP and I’ve been on the document saying he’s additionally an excellent dude. So if he needs to resort to that stage, despite the fact that we’re each grown males and if he had one thing to say, he is aware of my quantity and he refrains from doing in order that’s what he has to reside with.” -via Terrible Asserting / November 4, 2024

It’s the fourth-most costly NBA jersey of all time behind Jordan’s $10.1 million “Final Dance” jersey; a signed Kobe Bryant jersey worn in his lone MVP season in 2007-08 which offered for simply over $5.8 million; and a 1972 NBA Finals jersey worn by Wilt Chamberlain through the Los Angeles Lakers’ first NBA title run ($4.9 million) — all of which offered by way of Sotheby’s. The 1996-97 Jordan crimson jersey is the one MeiGray Authenticated crimson jersey from Jordan’s first 5 championship seasons. -via ESPN / November 5, 2024

For many of Karl-Anthony Cities’ life into his first a number of NBA seasons, he did the identical factor each time he made a visit to the charity stripe — a deep breath, two dribbles after which a deep squat earlier than taking pictures. However just a few years in the past, after taking pictures 80-plus p.c from the free-throw line by means of his first 4 seasons, Cities did what many creatures of behavior wouldn’t dare to: he modified up his routine. “I used to be watching Kobe (Bryant), the way in which he was taking pictures, the way in which he was minimizing power used on the free-throw line,” Cities mentioned. “I performed a ton of 2K to get that free-throw type down. “You suppose I’m joking? I’m deadass severe.” -via New York Instances / November 4, 2024

Who was one of the best participant within the league whenever you performed? Goran Dragic: Positively it’s Kobe Bryant. If I’m going again, I play the 2010 Western Convention Finals, Phoenix versus Lakers, I see that Mamba mentality. It was unbelievable. We put like three or 4 guys on Kobe, and he was simply smiling and taking pictures over three guys and scoring. He had an excellent group. He had Pau Gasol, [Andrew] Bynum, [Jordan] Farmar, [Lamar] Odom, all these gamers, however when the sport was on the road, everyone knows the place the ball was going to go, however we couldn’t cease it. So for me, for positive it was Kobe Bryant at the moment. After which you have got D-Wade, LeBron James, you have got many many gamers, I might say Kobe was one of the best nearer, and D-Wade. Once I performed with D-Wade I noticed so many video games the place he would take the ball and convey us residence. And that was unbelievable. -via HoopsHype / November 1, 2024

NBA Communications: Different nominees... West: DeMar DeRozan (SAC), Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (OKC), Kyrie Irving (DAL) and Nikola Jokić (DEN) East: Jalen Brunson and Karl-Anthony Cities (NYK), Jayson Tatum (BOS) and Nikola Vučević (CHI) -via Twitter / November 4, 2024

What number of titles do you suppose your good buddy Luka Doncic will win by the point he retires? Goran Dragic: I actually don’t know. That every one will depend on the entrance workplace, how they’re gonna encompass him with gamers. Final 12 months they have been actually good. I feel no person anticipate them to play within the Finals. The chemistry with him and Kyrie [Irving] was actually superb, and everybody adopted. I do suppose that signing Klay Thompson, they will have much more firepower, however on the finish of the day, are they going to have the ability to play protection? So that you by no means know, particularly with now within the NBA, there’s quite a lot of good groups. You’ve OKC, they gonna be good, you bought Minnesota, you bought Phoenix, you may by no means doubt Lakers with LeBron, then you have got Denver with Nikola Jokic, Dallas is right here, then you definitely bought Boston, you bought Miami, Milwaukee is a group that dissatisfied final 12 months, however we’ll see. I consider that Luka will win MVP as a result of he’s such an excellent participant. He’s placing up loopy numbers, however it all will depend on the entrance workplace, how they gonna encompass him with a group. I feel they’ve an opportunity, however we’ll see. I undoubtedly want him to win one as a result of he’s an excellent buddy of mine, and he’s coming from Slovenia, we’ve got truly 5 guys who received it, Rasho Nesterovic, Sasha Vujacic, Beno Udrih, Vlatko Cancar, and I want him to be the fifth one. -via HoopsHype / November 1, 2024

StatMuse: Kyrie tonight: 35 PTS 5 AST 6-8 3P Mavs are undefeated when Kyrie has 35+ factors and 5+ threes. pic.x.com/du61hRzJdE -via Twitter @statmuse / October 30, 2024

A game-worn Michael Jordan jersey from the Chicago Bulls’ 1996-97 season has offered for $4.68 million by way of Sotheby’s. The jersey was worn in not less than 17 video games through the season, together with the sport wherein rookie sensation Allen Iverson crossed Jordan over. -via ESPN / November 5, 2024

However as Amrany recalled, when the Michael Jordan statute was publicly unveiled at a press convention on Nov. 1, 1994, it was not roundly greeted with reward. Somewhat, there have been quite a lot of preliminary complaints from the general public and media over the way in which it portrayed Jordan’s face, together with the choice to maintain the Corridor of Fame’s famously wagging tongue hid behind his lips. “They didn’t like that his face wasn’t proper off a cereal field,” mentioned Amrany. “They didn’t need what (Jordan) mentioned he wished. And so they didn’t know that, as a result of they weren’t assembly him, they didn’t sit with him.” Mercifully, that have lengthy predated the period of social media and the present “world of algorithms,” as Amrany places it. The peanut gallery is infinitely extra vital and voluble in 2024. “I imply, after 20 articles (about Dwyane Wade’s sculpture) within the final three days,” Amrany mentioned, “what you develop into will not be well-known, however notorious.” -via Sportico / November 4, 2024

Chris Webber: “To me, the best basketball participant of all time is Michael Jordan… the time it was in my life, for beating my unhealthy boys… like, once we used to look at SportsCenter each day, and Tiger [Woods] was profitable one out of 5… Jordan is supplying you with 45, Christmas, profitable championships… I bought to see him go away for baseball when his father handed away… watching him hug that trophy… Jordan undoubtedly had probably the most affect.” -via YouTube / November 1, 2024