Please, be quiet about this, tell it to no one. Hey, keep your head down as the secret will be revealed. NBAObsessed can remember when Abdul-Jabbar was Lew Alcindor, a skinny kid from the streets of New York City that was recruited to play for John Wooden. Ok, that would make my age about minus 14.

Here is a classic story that maybe you have heard before and it happened for real to NBAObsessed. Your intrepid author was reading Sports Illustrated in his youth, an annual issue on college basketball ranking all the teams.

David Stern is probably thanking Kareem Abdul Jabbar for making the league more popular

Back then there was no internet, no VCRs, DVRs, no Cell Phones, and Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter weren’t even dreamed up yet. We only had 5 things to get information from, Network channels on broadcast TV from a TV antennae, Newspapers, Radio, Playboy (in a brown paper wrapper), and Sports Illustrated.

Now with that background you can gather that we read Sports Illustrated from cover to cover and they always hired the best writers. The annual Basketball issue was always a great one. Your gallivanting author tore into it and literally devoured the first story. It talked about a team that was unbeatable with a tall center that was everyone’s pick for player of the year.

There was only one problem with their ranking of both team and player; the story was about the freshman team at UCLA with Lew Alcindor in the pivot and freshmen were ineligible to play varsity basketball in those days. The varsity at UCLA went on to win the National Title that year with Walt Hazzard and Gail Goodrich playing guards, but they were beaten in practice by their own freshmen team!

Lew became Kareem and the NBA was never the same again. Now Lew Alcindor is facing Leukemia and trying to still live the life he has created in the post NBA world.

The NBA’s all-time leading scorer and six-time league MVP was diagnosed last December with chronic myeloid leukemia, he told The Associated Press on Monday.

The 62-year-old Abdul-Jabbar said his doctor didn’t give any guarantees, but informed him: “You have a very good chance to live your life out and not have to make any drastic changes to your lifestyle.”

Abdul-Jabbar is taking an oral medication for the disease. He is a paid spokesman for the Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis, which makes a drug that treats the illness.

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Kareem has always found a way to succeed and be a champion and even with Cancer he has found a way!
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The Phoenix Suns came to play this year, led by MVP candidate Steve Nash and coached by Terry Porter.

NBAObsessed has written about Steve and the Suns before.

This one came out yesterday:

Steve Nash and the Red Hot Suns

And this one came out a week ago:

Steve Nash is raising Arizona

Now the Phoenix Suns are leading the Power Rankings from NBA.com edging out the Boston Celtics and the Los Angeles Lakers. Here is what John Shuman had to say about Phoenix.

Pace: 100.6 (2), Off: 109.1 (5), Def: 103.8 (15)
Most impressive about the Suns’ start is that five of their seven games have been on the road. In handing the Celtics their first loss on Friday, they made Boston look like a bad defensive team. Then the Suns got defensive themselves in Washington.
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Surprising Atlanta is positioned at number 6 by sacrificing defense for offense led by Jamal Crawford the former New York Knick.

Even more surprising is Portland at number 9 using a 3 guard lineup featuring Andre Miller the former 76er.

LeBron is stuck at 11

Woeful, at least woeful for Cleveland, the Cavaliers are placed at number 11. NBAObsessed warned that adding Shaq may plug up the middle and slow down the team. There are no doubts that Shaq can still play high caliber ball for a game or two, but for a season? Remains to be seen. Hopefully Shaq proves NBAObsessed wrong on this one, because how can you not root for the Shaq?

Mike Brown admits that he’s still experimenting with his lineups, looking for the right combinations. The Shaq/Ilgauskas twin-towers frontcourt is even (+0) in 33 minutes of floor time, but Shaq and LeBron are a -11 in 122 minutes together. They need time.

As a side note my Detroit Pistons are lagging back at number 18, three spots up from last week, but have lost Hamilton and Prince to injuries and are depending on an aging Ben Wallace.

Chris Paul and the Hornets are stuck at 25. What has happened to them?

Last and least are the Knicks and Nets. New York is certainly hurting for good basketball right now.

Photo source Newscom

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The Phoenix Suns are just as hot as that yellow orb in the sky and in some ways even hotter. The Suns are 6 – 1 on the young season leading the Western Conference and a half game up on the Lakers in the Pacific division. The Sun God Ra would be proud of the way Phoenix is scorching the competition. The Suns have exceeded 100 points in every game this year.

Ok, enough with the puns, the Phoenix Suns and Steve Nash took down the Washington Wizards and Gilbert Arenas 102 – 90 in a road game. Road games appear to be a specialty for the Suns who now have a 4 -1 road record.

The Suns were turnover prone early and had to uncharacteristically depend on defense with Jason Richardson and Grant Hill guarding the Washington All Stars Gilbert Arenas and Caron Butler.

The Suns are supposed to be flawed defensively and with rebounding. They lured Washington into jump shots and the Wizards wound up shooting 39 percent from the field. Even bigger, they kept the Wizards to 12 second-chance points. Jason Richardson mostly guarded Gilbert Arenas, who went 7 for 22 from the field. Grant Hill covered the Wizards’ other All-Star in action, holding Caron Butler to 7-of-19 shooting while lead the Suns in rebounding for the fourth time in seven games.
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NBAObsessed has discussed the contributions in offense and leadership by Steve Nash before.

——> Steve Nash is raising Arizona

Steve Nash looks one way and passes the other

Steve Nash continues to play at an MVP level for the Suns and this game was no exception. Jason Richardson was not only making Gilbert Arenas work hard, but was the major contributor in the scoring end for the Suns as well.

Nash had 17 assists to go with 11 points, assisting on seven Suns baskets in the third quarter that sent the Suns to the fourth quarter with an 80-71 lead. Jason Richardson led the Suns’ scoring again with 22 points, including four of the Suns’ 12 3-pointers. The Suns’ frontcourt players all had double-doubles – Hill (13 points, 13 rebounds, Amar’e Stoudemire (17 points, 12 rebounds) and Channing Frye (18 points, 10 rebounds).

It is early in the season, but maybe we took the Phoenix Suns and Steve Nash a little too lightly in our predictions of an easy Laker Division win.

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The Memphis Grizzlies are soon going to be faced with admitting to a mistake about signing the enigmatic Allen Iverson as the unfolding saga of a Superstar with no gas in the tank is unfolding in front of their eyes. The appeal of having Allen Iverson on your team is understandable to anyone. Allen can take his small NBA body and light up the scoreboard at times with so little effort that you have to just stare with awe.

The problem with taking on Allen Iverson is Allen Iverson. He has never understood the concept of team or even coach and let’s not even talk about practice. That was a joke, of course, alluding to Allen’s famous quip when he played for Larry Brown in Philadelphia. Larry the Master is probably the coach that came closest to harnessing the power of the Iverson.

The NBA has seemed to get tougher for Allen Iverson and anyone that signs him and one has to wonder why? One has to wonder if this is the end of the line.

It was impossible to watch the Grizzlies’ 114-98 loss to the Lakers last night and not come away with the impression that this was one of the low points of Iverson’s career. In his third game since injuring his left hamstring during the preseason, Iverson once again came off the bench and scored just eight points in 22 minutes.

There he was, a glorified bench-warmer wilting amid the bright lights of the Staples Center. And there stood the transcendent Kobe Bryant, a fellow future Hall of Famer who scored 41 points and looked electric in the process – in other words, resembling the sort of player Iverson once was and believes he still can be.
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Allen Iverson struggling with the NBA

Even though we don’t know what the Truth is about the Truth (Iverson’s early nickname), we do know that he is troubled and has asked for a leave of absence.

The Allen Iverson saga has taken another turn as the veteran guard asked for and was granted permission to leave the Grizzlies to deal with a personal matter, according to an NBA source.

Iverson, 34, met with Griz owner Michael Heisley Friday night following the team’s 114-98 loss to the Los Angeles Lakers. The pair met again this morning, and Iverson was expected to depart for Atlanta this afternoon.
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So why do we talk about Allen?

Because he is interesting, eclectic, a difference maker when he is on, and a major problem when he is not.

Will Allen return from Atlanta or will the Grizzlies cut their losses and move on? Will Allen regain his All Star form or just look longingly at Kobe Bryant? We don’t know the answers to these questions and that is why we still talk about him.

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Kurt Rambis was originally drafted by the Knicks and ended up playing for several teams, but is best known for his stints with the Lakers in L.A.

Rambis is the man with the goggles. That is how we will always remember him. Kurt averaged around 5 points and 5 rebounds for his career, but that is not what his career was all about. Rambis epitomized hustle and would make himself a pest to the other team. He was like a mad dog that the Lakers kept penned up and released whenever they felt it would cause the other team problems.

NBA Kurt Rambis factoid: Kurt Rambis had his jersey retired by Santa Clara University for being the all time leading scorer with 1,736 points.

Kevin Love brings the emotion!

NBA Legendary Coaches

Kurt had the opportunity to play for legendary Coach Pat Riley and Super Star Coach Phil Jackson. Today with the Timberwolves Kurt attempts to apply the triangle offense in the T’wolves offensive sets. It worked a whole lot better before Kevin Love was injured.

It is all new and all youth with Rambis and the T’wolves. Even his coaches are learning.

“There are no holdover players from my system,” Rambis says. “They’re all learning. Even my assistant coaches are learning,” including former head coaches Bill Laimbeer (the WNBA’s Detroit Shock), Reggie Theus (Sacramento Kings) and Dave Wohl (New Jersey Nets).

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Besides Kevin Love, the Timberwolves have speedy Jonny Flynn and big Al Jefferson. All young and all learning and as much as Rambis would want to take them to the playoffs, it won’t be this year. In the meantime Kurt is making his mark as a teacher and patient coach. Maybe he needs to find someone wearing goggles to really start winning!

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The NBA is a paradise of pampered ultra elite athletes that have failed to realize how special their lives truly are compared to the rest of us average people that slog it out every day just to get a check that won’t quite last until the next check.

Allen Iverson NBA superstar

Allen Iverson is a case in point causing disruption everywhere he goes, in spite of talent that just oozes out of his pores. Speaking of pours, not pores, Allen refuses to pour his heart into his team as in what is good for the team and rather prefers to play to what is good for Allen. If that happens to mesh with Team, then the age old saying of there is no I in Team becomes nothing more than a restated euphemism. Problem is that in most cases there is no I in Team and Allen becomes a problem to be dealt with on a team level and a PR level. That is what the Memphis Grizzlies are dealing with right now.

NBA superstar Allen Iverson is grumbling as a Grizzlie

Iverson missed all of the Memphis Grizzlies preseason NBA games and the first 3 regular season NBA games and now expects to be automatically a starter. The Coach has a big time problem with that attitude.

“My frustration is that I have to talk about Allen Iverson at every press setting,” Hollins said. “I want to talk about the Memphis Grizzlies and us as a team. And even when Allen was out, I was happy to talk about Allen. So, that’s my frustration. I just want to talk about the Memphis Grizzlies. If Allen plays well and you guys want to ask me about Allen, that’s great. Or if he plays poorly and you want to ask me how poorly he played, that’s great, too.
“But what he says and what he’s thinking? My job is to coach the team as a unit. I have to make decisions and all the players in that locker room are not going to be happy about it. But it’s my job to do the best that I can and if they don’t feel like I’m doing it than ownership is going to get rid of me and that’s the way it’s always been through history.”

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Allen Iverson on defense

In an odd statement after the Grizzlies lost another NBA game, this time to the Warriors, it was Allen Iverson speaking up about defense, a subject it was suspected that he knew very little about.

“It’s been rough,” Iverson said after logging 28 minutes in his second game back from a hamstring injury. “You have to take on an individual challenge to guard the guy you have in front of you. It starts with having the heart to guard your man. … Not a lot of players like to play defense. Winning teams play defense.”

It was difficult to find anyone in the Grizzlies’ locker room who didn’t share Hollins’ mood or who disagreed with Iverson’s answer.
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Defense? Why are we talking about defense?

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Has Dirk Nowitzki started an early bid for MVP with an incredible fourth quarter of 29 points against the Utah Jazz? Dirk had 40 total points on a night when for 3 quarters he just could not get it going and it looked like a boring defeat at the hands of the Jazz, but then the magic scoring hands of Nowitzki went to work and broke Mark Aguirre’s 1 quarter Maverick scoring record.

NBA factoid: Last December Carmelo Anthony had 33 in a single quarter to tie George Gervin’s all time NBA record.

Mark Aguirre had 27 on March 24th 1984.

Dirk had Jason Terry just gushing.

He scored 23 of 25 Maverick points in one stretch, including a step-back jumper with 2:05 to go that put them ahead, 85-83.

“It was tremendous,” Jason Terry said of Nowitzki’s fourth quarter. “Dirk put us on his back and showed us why he’s the MVP. We were in it defensively all night long. But offensively we struggled. It was getting to us. … But we didn’t let our defensive effort lack. I think that’s what kept us in the game.
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Dirk Nowitzki with classic shooting form

Dirk Nowitzki has 29 in the fourth

For the Dallas Mavericks the true test will come at the defensive end as a team loaded with offensive stars attempts to stop the opposing team from scoring, which is something they have not shown a strong propensity to accomplish in the past.

What’s more significant to me is that the Mavs have won three consecutive games despite not shooting better than 41.7 percent in any game this season. Last year, when they shot 42.5 percent of worse from the floor, they were 3-25. In many ways, just like the Rangers, this offense has traditionally been so good that if it gets even a touch of defense, it wins. Since that rather rough season opener, the Mavs have won as much because of defense as anything.

That is most definitely a change in this team. Maybe it’s only a one-week aberration, but, at least for a week, you have to figure the attention to defense is paying off for this team.
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If the Defensive Trend continues for the Dallas Mavericks then you can look for an extended playoff run at the end of the year.

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Ahh, remember those warm nights in college when girls would streak across the softball field? Whatever happened to those days? Sorry, getting a little off the subject.

Tayshaun Prince

Tayshaun Prince has started 439 games in a row, which in the modern NBA with all the travel, is quite a prodigious streak. Painfully, especially for Tay, it will come to an end tonight.

His games-played streak was second among active players, trailing Andre Miller, and his games-started streak of 439 was the longest active run.

The bad news was compounded by the fact that coach John Kuester said that shooting guard Rip Hamilton definitely will miss the Toronto game and is unlikely to return Friday.

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When you look at Tayshaun Prince he seems so thin and so frail that no one would have guessed that he would become one of the league’s leading iron men.

NBA factoid: Robert Parrish played in 1,611 games in his career an NBA All Time record.

Tay last sat out a game in his rookie year and last did not start in his second year. Prince had trouble winning the confidence of Rick Carlisle in his rookie year and frankly did not show up until the playoffs. It was in the playoffs that Carlisle discovered that Tayshaun could back his man down and score with an odd looking twisting left handed shot. It was almost unstoppable due to the fact that it had never been seen during the regular season.

Tayshaun will be among the missing for tonight's game

Tayshaun has played in 537 games and another 118 games in the playoffs.

NBA factoid: A.C. Green played in 1,192 straight games and NBA All Time record.

The injury has come at a bad time for the Pistons with Rip Hamilton out as well. This Piston team does not have the depth or number of veterans that the Pistons teams of recent past.

Photo source Newscom

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Maybe you have missed the big news about the economy? It is becoming more apparent that the whole crash thing with the banks and the stock market was all a hoax or maybe it has run its course, because money is floating around everywhere. Boston just floated a whole boat load of money over to Rajon Rondo to keep him from becoming a restricted free agent in the upcoming blockbuster free agent market of next year.

League sources said the extension is for five years and guarantees Rondo at least $55 million. With the two sides facing a Monday deadline to get a deal done, Duffy said he called Celtics president Danny Ainge on Sunday to inform him Rondo was prepared to play out his contract and become a restricted free agent next summer because they weren’t satisfied with the team’s previous offers. Ainge, however, surprised Duffy by responding that Rondo’s contract hopes would be met.

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Rajon is on an old Boston team where the 4 All Star players are all over 30. That would include Ray Allen, Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett, and the newly picked up Rasheed Wallace. Rajon is not only young, but gives the speed to a team that needs speed.

Rajon is rich!

The money is also being floated to other players and hopefully you will get your share, but you have to have a jump shot or something.

Rondo’s new deal averages $11 million a season, the same amount San Antonio Spurs All-Star point guard Tony Parker(notes) earned when he signed a six-year, $66 million extension to his rookie contract in 2004. Among members of Rondo’s 2006 rookie class, Portland Trail Blazers All-Star guard Brandon Roy received a five-year, $80 million contract extension. The Blazers also gave forward LaMarcus Aldridge a five-year, $65 million extension.

You have to wonder how expensive seats will have to stay at the NBA games to support these salaries, while the rest of us are taking layoffs, furlough days, and pay cuts.

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Now it is time to play who makes more in the NBA as provided by Hoopsworld. The answers will be at the bottom of the blog.

Are you ready?

A) Who makes more Boston Celtics… Ray Allen, Paul Pierce, or Kevin Garnett?

B) Who makes more Cleveland Cavaliers… LeBron James, Shaquille O’Neil, or Mo Williams?

C) Who makes more Denver Nuggets… Carmelo Anthony, Chauncey Billups, or Kenyon Martin?

D) Who makes more Los Angeles Lakers… Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol, or Ron Artest?

E) Who makes more New Orleans Hornets… Chris Paul, Emeka Okafor, or Peja Stojakovic?

F) Who makes more San Antonio Spurs… Tim Duncan, Tony Parker, or Richard Jefferson?

G) Who makes more Dallas Mavericks… Jason Kidd, Josh Howard, or Dirk Nowitzki?

H) Who makes more Orlando Magic… Dwight Howard, Rashard Lewis, or Vince Carter?

I) Who makes more Miami Heat… Dwyane Wade, Michael Beasley, or Jermaine O’Neal?

J) Who makes more Detroit Pistons… Ben Gordon, Charlie Villenueva, or Rip Hamilton?

Tim Duncan makes a lot of cash!

Answers from Hoopsworld:
A) Paul Pierce $19,795,712.
B) Shaquille O’Neal $21,000,000.
C) Kenyon Martin $15,613,636.
D) Kobe Bryant $23,034,375.
E) Peja Stojakovic $13,392,000.
F) Tim Duncan $22,183,220.
G) Dirk Nowitzki $19,795,714.
H) Rashard Lewis $18,010,791.
I) Jermaine O’Neal $23,016,000.
J) Rip Hamilton $11,625,000.

Photo source Newscom

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