| And the winners are
... By Jeffrey Denberg Special to ESPN.com | |
The NBA wants our ballots by Sunday. I'm not going to sit on the fence. I'm going to make my decisions now and I'll share my reasons:
Coach of the Year: I thought about Pat Riley and Mike Dunleavy. Chuck Daly did a nice job in Orlando, as did Lenny Wilkens in Atlanta. You can't knock Jerry Sloan. But I'm going with Larry Brown, who should be in the Hall of Fame, who should have been one of the NBA's top 50 coaches. The guy turned Allen Iverson into a winner and gave Philadelphia its first .500 season or better since 1991. Brown's building a serious contender in Philly, and what else you would expect from the most innovative coach of our time?
Rookie of the Year: Vince Carter became a sometimes spectacular, highly productive player on a team that is contending for a playoff berth. In my mind. that gives him a leg up on Paul Pierce and Mike Bibby, though Jason Williams also deserves some support.
Defensive Player: Dikembe Mutombo is doing a terrific job on the interior and Kendall Gill and Eddie Jones will steal your shorts. But I'm voting for Alonzo Mourning. Not only is 'Zo blocking four shots a game, he scares me -- and I think a good defender should be a scary guy.
Sixth Man: Hands down, we're going for Darrell Armstrong who is such a good sixth man, his team started to crumble when he was in the starting lineup because the Magic missed the spark they were getting off the bench. I'm also going to throw a bouquet to Grant Long, who has lifted the Hawks above the level of mediocrity.
Most Improved: Eric Snow went from an afterthought to a starting point guard in Philadelphia. Gary Trent became a good player on a bad Dallas team. But there's nothing in the rules that say you can't vote for a player twice, so I'm casting another ballot here Orlando's Armstrong.
MVP: Mourning is 14th in scoring, sixth in rebounds, first in blocks. He makes half his shots and he has held a broken-down Miami team together through a difficult campaign. He's my choice. The others, in order, are Iverson, Tim Duncan, Shaquille O'Neal and Grant Hill.
All NBA: First team -- center, Mourning; forwards, Duncan and Kevin Garnett; guards, Iverson and Jason Kidd; Second team -- center, O'Neal; forwards, Karl Malone and Chris Webber; guards, Gary Payton and Tim Hardaway; Third team -- center, Dikembe Mutombo; forwards, Hill and Charles Barkley; guards, Stephon Marbury and Damon Stoudamire.
Infighting on the
Pistons
There are some -- not I -- who say that to know Christian Laettner
at all is to know him too well.
I bring that up because I want to pay tribute to Laettner, who did something very brave and selfless the other night when he incited teammate Jerry Stackhouse to punch him in the eye during the poker game on Detroit's flight home from Charlotte.
How many players would taunt a teammate, call him a girly-man, things like that, knowing that player was suffering personal tragedy in his life, physically hurting and maybe feeling a little sorry for himself? Laettner would.
With the Pistons in a losing funk, probably feeling badly because he could not play himself, Laettner changed the subject, so to speak, tussling with Stackhouse, the two winding up in the lap of team broadcaster George Blaha. And was he elated!
Management played its role to the hilt, denying everything, then threatening a $25,000 fine for anyone who talked about what team spokesman Matt Dobek said never happened, then terminating the card game -- probably guts or maybe tonk. The players had a good laugh at that, and then went out and beat Toronto.
All thanks to Christian Laettner. See, you really didn't know him at all.
On the other hand, there's no covering up the problems the Pistons are having -- the conflict between de facto general manager Rick Sund, who is building for tomorrow, and coach Alvin Gentry, who feels pressure to win today.
"I am going to find five guys who want to play hard and compete for four quarters, I don't care if it's five guards," Gentry said other day, leading the Hawks' Long to say, "They had one, but they didn't want me."
Gentry has gone out of his way to let everyone know the Pistons could have had Matt Harpring or Michael Doleac, but Sund chose Bonzi Wells (who has since been traded to Portland) in the draft.
The Pistons have dealt this year's first-round draft pick -- and one from Portland -- to the Hawks, so Sund won't make that mistake again.
But the question of what to do with Loy Vaught ($25 million and can't play) is a team problem that won't go away. Then there's Laettner himself ...
Insiders are betting Sund loses power, if not his job, next season when Joe Dumars retires and moves into the front office.
Casey on campaign
trail
Don Casey is campaigning for the Nets' coaching job on a
permanent basis. He probably won't get it, but in restoring order in New Jersey,
Casey has reminded the league's owners that he is a resourceful coach as well as
a bright, witty man.
Not a bad idea
Wes
Unseld, Wizards
executive vice president and general manager, says he will relinquish part or
all of his responsibilities if the club's next coach wants those duties and can
handle them.
Not a bad idea. Unseld has presided over a pretty sorry outfit. One thing, though -- if he didn't walk around the arena wearing a headset and carrying a walkie-talkie, maybe Unseld would have a better grasp of what's happening on the court.
Strickland goes
backward
Wizards point guard Rod Strickland went
out to play against the Hawks on Friday night with his shorts on backward so the
NBA logo rode on his hip, prompting referee Ed T. Rush to wonder, "How did
he tie 'em up?"
Six hours later, Strickland was arrested on charges of drunken and reckless driving -- three weeks after his probation ended for a driving-while-impaired conviction.
Now, understand that downtown Washington was virtually deserted because of the NATO celebration. Why, the only people on the streets were police.
The Magic has
disappeared
Penny Hardaway says
he can't explain the late-season decline of the Orlando Magic.
There are others who can. They point to Ike Austin, who is overweight and too slow because of it, and to Hardaway, who doesn't want to play the point and must on this team.
And they point to Bo Outlaw and Nick Anderson, neither of whom has regained their rhythm after being injured. That's what happens in a crazy season when you elect not to practice.
There, that was simple, wasn't it?
