The NBA season is coming up quickly and the news and rumors are ramping up.
Check out the latest buzz below.
Irving Back on Floor with Cavaliers
CLEVELAND—Cavaliers All-Star point guard Kyrie Irving is coming back to the court after missing three games with a sprained right ankle.
Irving had his ankle stepped on by teammate Anderson Varejao in practice early last week and didn’t play in Brazil when Cleveland faced the Miami Heat.
Cavs coach David Blatt says Irving will play in Friday’s exhibition against Dallas. Blatt says Irving “is raring to go, and that’s good.” Blatt isn’t worried about Irving’s conditioning because he played this summer with USA basketball.
Blatt is anxious to get Irving on the floor with LeBron James and Kevin Love in advance of the Oct. 30 season opener. Love, though, will not play against the Mavericks. Blatt wants to rest Love, who has played in all four preseason games but was bothered by a stiff neck after a collision in Wednesday night’s game in Cincinnati.
Celtics Get Bynum in Trade With Pacers
BOSTON—The Boston Celtics have traded center Joel Anthony to the Detroit Pistons for guard Will Bynum.
Bynum averaged 8.7 points and 3.9 assists over 56 games last season, his seventh in the NBA.
Anthony has averaged 2.3 points and 3 rebounds in his seven years in the league. He spent the first six years with the Miami Heat before he was traded to the Celtics in January.
He scored 22 points in 21 games after coming to Boston.
Jordan Says 82 Games Not a Problem
Michael Jordan, former NBA star and current Charlotte Hornets owner, says that the length of the season isn’t a problem.
“I love both of those guys, but as an owner who played the game, I loved playing. If I wasn’t playing 82 games, I still would’ve been playing somewhere else because that’s the love for the game I had,” he told ESPN.
“As a player, I never thought 82 games was an issue.”
“Both those guys” refers to LeBron James and Dirk Nowitzki, who recently voiced support for shortening the NBA season.
“I think you don’t need 82 games to determine the best eight in each conference,” Nowitzki said recently.
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“That could be done a lot quicker, but I always understand that it’s about money, and every missed game means missed money for both parties, for the league, for the owners, for the players. I understand all that and that’s why I don’t think it’s going to change any time soon.”
James addressed the test that the NBA is doing during the preseason of shortening not the schedule, but games from 48 minutes to 44 minutes (11 minute quarters instead of 12 minute quarters).
“It’s not the minutes, it’s the games. The minutes don’t mean anything. We can play 50-minute games if we had to. It’s the games that I think we all as players think is too many games in our season. 82 games are a lot,” he told Cleveland.com.
“But it’s not the minutes, taking away minutes from the game is not going to shorten the game at all.”
Cavs, Pacers to do Trade Involving Hibbert?
The Cleveland Cavaliers and Indiana Pacers are reportedly trying to do a deal involving Roy Hibbert.
The center had a pretty good year for Indiana last season but fell apart near the end, as the Pacers were easily ousted by the Heat in the Eastern Conference finals after barely beating the Atlanta Hawks and Washington Wizards.
“With little hope of salvaging the 2014-15 season [due to the Paul George injury], Indiana may seek to unload the big-man’s near $15-million salary to collect young assets to plan for the future,” reported Rant Sports.
“Luckily, the Cleveland Cavaliers possess both the need for a dominant rim protector and the assets to possibly entice Larry Bird enough for him to pull the trigger. Dion Waiters has often been subject to trade rumors due to his inability to get along with Kyrie Irving, in addition to his unwillingness to come off of the bench.”
The rumors about Hibbert haven’t been confirmed but the report says that Waiters would fit into the Cavs style of play. However, the Cavs would likely need to include a big man as well, such as Anderson Varejao.
Rodman Agrees that JR Smith is the New Rodman
Dennis Rodman has chipped in and agreed with new New York Knicks president Phil Jackson that mercurial shooting guard J.R. Smith is the next Rodman.
Jackson didn’t quite say it like that, but he did answer a question about getting through to Smith about his immaturity.
“I don’t know if that’s possible or not. He might be one of those guys that’s a little bit like Dennis Rodman that has an outlier kind of side to him,” Jackson told the New York Post.
“But I’m gonna get to know him as we go along, and we’ll find a way to either make him a very useful player on our organization, or whatever.”
Now Rodman has come along and told his Twitter fans that he sees Smith’s similarities to himself.
“Sending love to the zen master @PhilJackson11 and the @nyknicks for this season. Good luck to @therealjrsmith who is the new Dennis Rodman,” he said.
Smith wasn’t affronted by the comparison, telling the New York Daily News, “”Last time I checked Dennis Rodman’s got what three, four rings?
“I’m not offended by that. It’s an honor. He’s a Hall of Famer. And to be put in the same words as a Hall of Famer is something special. So I’m not offended at all.”
Bucks Add 7 Business Leaders
MILWAUKEE—The Milwaukee Bucks have added seven business leaders to its ownership group as it works to rebuild the team and develops plans to replace an aging arena.
The Bucks said Friday the additional members include five prominent African-American executives who have been involved in major civic initiatives The five formed Partners for Community Impact this summer to explore economic development opportunities, including the Bucks, according to one of its members, Valerie Daniels-Carter, president and CEO of V&J Holdings Cos., a fast-food company with 4,000 employees in five states.
The additional investors give team owners Wesley Edens, Marc Lasry and Jamie Dinan strong backing as they settle on the site for a new arena to replace the 26-year-old BMO Harris Bradley Center, one of the oldest active NBA arenas. Edens has said the owners hope to pick the site for the multipurpose arena by the end of the year.
The Bucks, in a statement naming the additional investors, noted that PCI has previously been involved in urban economic development and renewal projects. Building a new Bucks arena is part of larger economic development opportunities for Milwaukee, Daniels-Carter said.
“It’ important for where ever the arena goes that there is development around the arena. It just makes economic sense. It’s a point of destination that is inclusive of opportunities to do other things,” said Daniels-Carter, who played basketball at Lincoln University in Missouri and was drafted by the Milwaukee Does in 1978.
The National Basketball Association has approved PCI’s ownership bid, as well as that of Gale Klappa, CEO of Wisconsin Energy Corp., and Jon Hammes, managing partner of Hammes, according to the Bucks.
Besides Daniels-Carter, members of PCI include Michael Barber, Chief Operating Officer of GE Healthcare; Virgis Colbert, a retired executive vice president of worldwide operations for Miller Brewing Co.; Charles Harvey, a Johnson Controls vice president and president of the Johnson Controls Foundation; and Cory Nettles, founder and managing director of General Growth Capital.
Klappa, who heads the state’s largest electric and natural gas utility, said he couldn’t pass on joining the franchise.
“All of us are united in our goal of building the Bucks organization into an economic engine for Milwaukee and Wisconsin, providing quality jobs in the community, supporting economic growth and making substantive progress on building our statewide workforce,” Klappa said in a statement.
The amount of investment by PCI and Klappa and Hammes was not disclosed.
Mavs Sign Tiny Point Guard
The Dallas Mavericks inked a deal with 5’7″ guard Yuki Togashi, who has earned acclaim for his dribbling and passing skills despite his small size.
The terms of the deal weren’t disclosed.
Togashi played for the Mavs summer league team, averaging 5.3 points while shooting .467 from the field.
“The team’s plan reportedly is for the 21-year-old Togashi to spend the rest of the preseason with the Mavs before joining their D-League affiliate Texas Legends,” reported Basketball Insiders.
It noted that Togashi, native of Niigata, Japan, attended high school in the U.S. at Montrose Christian School in Rockville, Md., which produced NBA players Kevin Durant, Terrence Ross and Greivis Vasquez.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.