Clippers Deal Barnes/Hawes For Stephenson

The second sizable pre-draft trade went down on Monday night as the Clippers acquired Lance Stephenson from the Hornets for veterans Matt Barnes and Spencer Hawes.

Charlotte washing their hands of Stephenson after just one season isn’t surprising, but what they got in return is certainly a bit of a head-scratcher. It’s been reported that the Hornets may choose to cut Barnes and eat the remaining $3 million of his salary, leaving the issue of adding an expensive Hawes to an already packed front court. 

2015 NBA Finals Preview & Prediction

Even with the Super Bowl-esque nine day break between Game 5 of the Western Conference Finals and Game 1 of the NBA Finals, the buzz surrounding the Golden State and Cleveland matchup has not wavered one bit. There are a myriad of storylines and outcomes that this Finals will produce one way or another that will have a rippling effect felt around the NBA.

Bulls Fire Tom Thibodeau

The Chicago Bulls have informed head coach Tom Thibodeau that he will be relieved of his duties in a meeting this afternoon. The news is not surprising, as it was well known prior to this report that the Bulls front office and Thibodeau had a long growing rift between them and that the coach had spent his last game on the sidelines in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference semi-finals against the Cavaliers.

The New Orleans Pelicans are rumored to be interested in hiring Thibodeau for their head coaching vacancy.

Thibodeau was 255-139 in five seasons with the Bulls, and won the NBA Coach of the Year award in 2010-11.

The Bulls now look to fill the newest job opening in the league. Early candidates are reportedly Warriors associate head coach Alvin Gentry and Iowa State head coach Fred Hoiberg. Gentry most recently was the head coach for the Phoenix Suns, and has also coached the Pistons, Heat and Clippers, amassing a 335-370 record in 12 seasons.

Curtain Closing On Cleveland’s One Man Show

The Conference Finals nearly finished in a record eight days, until Houston decided it would make a stand Monday night in Game 4. It would have been the first time in league history that both the Eastern and Western Conference Finals ended in sweeps. The league hates it, but for us fans, it’s a great thing. After the second round was thrilling, nail biting and buzzer beating, the Conference Finals have been the exact opposite.

Despite the Rockets pushing the Warriors to the brink in the first two games, they blew plenty of opportunities late in those games, and ostensibly quit after about fifteen minutes in Game 3. The Hawks took enormous hits in the first two games with injuries to DeMarre Carroll and Kyle Korver, adding to the litany of names on the Atlanta injury report, most of whom are playing through their bumps and bruises. Surprisingly, they rallied from down ten late in Game 3 before falling just short in overtime. Both teams had their best shots to put up a fight in their respective Game 3’s, and both failed. Even in last night’s Game 4 of the WCF, the Warriors were blown out from the start.

But looking ahead to the Finals, and it still looks very safe to do so, the NBA is happy. They have what essentially boils down to the dream matchup. It may very well be the most watched NBA Finals of all time. The best player in the game today will square off against the best team, captained by the MVP. Unfortunately for the fans, the NBA Finals will be just about as entertaining as these Conference Finals. Because the Cavs are in serious trouble. 

What’s Next For San Antonio?

It’s going to be an unusually long summer for the Spurs, which will certainly benefit the players, who played approximately an extra season’s worth of playoff games in the last four years. The question on everyone’s mind is just which players will be back from this season’s roster.

Going into the 2015 draft, the Spurs will only have five players under contract, Tony Parker, Boris Diaw, Tiago Splitter, Patty Mills and 2014 first round pick Kyle Anderson. It’s been reported that Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili are expected to return and the Spurs front office is operating under that assumption. But we are still about two weeks away from Ginobili’s self imposed month-long reflection period on what he’s going to do next year. So until then, all we can do is wait. However, there will be one player the team will add to their roster for sure, and he will be selected on June 25th at the 2015 NBA Draft. San Antonio will select 26th in the upcoming draft, and the direction they go may foreshadow what they expect to happen once free agency opens on July 1.

Multiple draft prospects that the Spurs have been linked to for their first round choice are big men. From Louisville’s Montrezl Harrell to Notre Dame’s Pat Connaughton, there are certainly some very talented prospects that could bolster the future of the San Antonio front court.

The other position expected to be addressed in the draft is point guard. With the good possibility that the Spurs cannot retain Cory Joseph in free agency, they surely are planning on addressing that rotational piece.

As the draft approaches there will be more reports about potential targets that will no doubt shed a little more light on who San Antonio is hoping to select in June. With the stellar drafting history of GM R.C. Buford and Coach Gregg Popovich, the routine late-first round draft pick is usually the most interesting offseason move for the Spurs.

But this year won’t be the normal summer for Spurs, as the team will certainly have some big changes to the roster compared to last season, when San Antonio returned their entire title winning roster. The first domino to drop will be the decisions of Duncan and Ginobili, and if they return, what they will be paid. After that, the team will be able to move on to (hopefully) targeting big name free agents like LaMarcus Aldridge, Marc Gasol, and Brook Lopez, before getting defensive player of the year Kawhi Leonard inked to his maximum salary five-year contract.

Minnesota Wins The NBA Draft Lottery

The Minnesota Timberwolves have won the 2015 NBA Draft Lottery. They had a 25% chance to win the first overall pick, marking just the fourth time since the current format began in 1994 that the team with the best chance to get the top pick has seen the correct ping pong ball combination pop up out of the machine. The consensus number one overall draft prospect is currently Karl-Anthony Towns from Kentucky.

The Lakers drew the second overall pick, after having the fourth best chance at the first pick. Philadelphia saw their number combo pop up for the third pick, as the Knicks were pushed out of the top three selections.

Philadelphia did not pick up either one of the conditional first round picks they stood to gain from the Lakers or Heat.

The NBA Draft Lottery Is Tonight

One of the most controversial elements of the NBA is the draft lottery, a system that allows all teams that don’t make the postseason a chance at the first overall pick in the upcoming draft. The lottery usually gives way to conspiracy theories, like the bent envelope in the 1985 lottery that netted the Knicks the first pick to draft Patrick Ewing. Considering that the worst team in the league has only won the first pick four times in the 30 years of the lottery, little has been done to quell the uproar from fans that occurs more often than not following the lottery proceedings. For example, in the past ten draft lotteries, only three times has a team won the lottery with more than the fifth best chance. During that span, Cleveland won the lottery three times, with the third, eighth and ninth worst record. While it certainly keeps it exciting for the fans of teams like the Oklahoma City Thunder, who own a 0.5 % chance of winning tonight’s lottery, despite owning a 45-37 record and a roster boasting the likes of Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and Serge Ibaka, it’s tough to think that a team like that could win the lottery (although the lowest percent chance of a winning team was Orlando in 1995 with a 1.52% chance), pushing teams with true needs further down the draft order.

How the lottery works

Based on overall record, from worst on up, each of the 14 teams that have been at home since the second week of April are assigned number combinations. There are 14 ping pong balls, numbered 1 through 14, and the combinations are assembled by drawing four of these balls at once. There are 1,001 possible combinations and 1,000 of them are assigned to teams.