Posts tagged CarmeloAnthony at FanHouse

Team USA had to work for it -- for three years, and for 40 minutes this morning -- but they earned what they sought: the gold medal. In a ridiculously entertaining match against Spain (a team the United States beat by 37 last week), Team USA pulled out the 11-point victory to grab the tournament victory.

The margin snuck within two points in the final quarter, as Spain relied on a heavy diet of absurd Juan Carlos Navarro floaters and Rudy Fernandez threes to stay within spitting range of the Americans. But Kobe Bryant was just as good, nailing some massive threes and doling out sweet assists. One of the Kobe threes -- shot from the fourth row -- also happened to goad Rudy into his fifth and final foul, adding a bonus to a vital four-point play. Kobe most definitely played up to his billing as the biggest American star in China.

Dwyane Wade was nuts in the first half, dropping 21 points in 14 minutes. (!) He cooled off, which was easily predictable given that he made his bed with threes in the first half and he's not a good deep shooter. LeBron James was ineffective in the second half, picking up his fourth foul early on in the final frame. Carmelo Anthony's shooting was off and on; Chris Paul was good but couldn't stick his threes. Deron Williams didn't get much of a chance on offense. The bigs were active but not overpowering ... in fact, the Brothers Gasol had plenty of space to operate in the paint.

Navarro's stream of floaters won't soon be forgotten, nor will Rudy's insane dunk over Dwight Howard. But Team USA's the story here -- four years after being humbled on the world's stage, American basketball is back on top.

Team USA had to work for it -- for three years, and for 40 minutes this morning -- but they earned what they sought: the gold medal. In a ridiculously entertaining match against Spain (a team the United States beat by 37 last week), Team USA pulled out the 11-point victory to grab the tournament victory.

The margin snuck within two points in the final quarter, as Spain relied on a heavy diet of absurd Juan Carlos Navarro floaters and Rudy Fernandez threes to stay within spitting range of the Americans. But Kobe Bryant was just as good, nailing some massive threes and doling out sweet assists. One of the Kobe threes -- shot from the fourth row -- also happened to goad Rudy into his fifth and final foul, adding a bonus to a vital four-point play. Kobe most definitely played up to his billing as the biggest American star in China.

Dwyane Wade was nuts in the first half, dropping 21 points in 14 minutes. (!) He cooled off, which was easily predictable given that he made his bed with threes in the first half and he's not a good deep shooter. LeBron James was ineffective in the second half, picking up his fourth foul early on in the final frame. Carmelo Anthony's shooting was off and on; Chris Paul was good but couldn't stick his threes. Deron Williams didn't get much of a chance on offense. The bigs were active but not overpowering ... in fact, the Brothers Gasol had plenty of space to operate in the paint.

Navarro's stream of floaters won't soon be forgotten, nor will Rudy's insane dunk over Dwight Howard. But Team USA's the story here -- four years after being humbled on the world's stage, American basketball is back on top.

When one thinks of war images, nothing truly translates like that timeless Joe Rosenthal image of Iwo Jima. Six American servicemen took Francis Scott Key to another octave, raising our stars and stripes on Mount Suribachi during a battle that killed nearly 7,000 American soldiers.

So, when talking about the Ryder Cup, a golf event that brings tons of emotion between Europe and the United States, what could really get us Yanks a little hot under the collar? A Portuguese television station, Sport TV, using that fabulous image as a magazine ad, dogging the United States.

Thanks to Copyranter we have the full spread of the statue raising an 18th hole flag in the air with the dates of the tournament in the top left corner. This is disrespectful and ignorant on so many humanitarian levels, but let's just talk about golf.

The Ryder Cup is match play, so a lot of the groupings never even make it to the 18th hole. Also, Portugal, really? There has never been a Ryder Cup ever hosted in the country, not to mention there has never been an individual from the country on the team to represent the Europeans.

The ad is pointless and weak. You don't see the NBA advertising Carmelo Anthony dunking an atomic bomb on Hiroshima because it would be classless and ridiculous, so why in the world would a country so meaningless in an event like the Ryder Cup drop something so brash?

You're Sport TV, stick to soccer highlights and, umm, soccer highlights?

Team USA is making a habit out of blowing out teams that are supposed to challenge them. This time it was Spain, who many considered the second best team in the Basketball Olympiad, featuring Pau Gasol, Marc Gasol, Rudy Fernandez, and Jose Calderon, along with 17 year old sensation Ricky Rubio. With speed, athleticism, and that vaunted European style of play, surely this would be the team that would challenge USA and expose their weaknesses.

And then they stepped on the floor. 119-82, USA.

Where do you want to start? How about three point shooting? That's been a weakness for Team USA. They shot 48% from the arc, with Carmelo Anthony as the spark plug with 16 points. Or defense? They held Spain to 39% shooting, creating 28 turnovers.

LeBron James was out of his mind today, obviously amped up and mouthing off. He finished with 18 points, 5 rebounds, 8 assists, and 4 steals. Yikes. Dwyane Wade 2.0 was again spectacular, with 16 points, 6 rebounds, and 2 steals (and a few more that weren't attributed because they ended up in someone else's hands). USA had 8 players in double figures.

Felipe Reyes had 19 points and 8 rebounds for Spain, and Pau Gasol chipped in 13 points, but also had 5 turnovers, as Team USA swarmed him the block. Spain's NBA-experienced guards, Juan Carlos Navarro and Jose Calderon, along with future first round pick Ricky Rubio combined to shoot 4 of 23 from the field, with 7 turnovers and 4 assists.

Throughout the Olympic men's basketball tournament, FanHouse will prioritize the games of the day for you in Golden Ticket.

Two heavyweight battles on the docket for the fourth day of the men's tournament, plus a couple other intriguing matchups.

GOLD: United States vs Spain, 10:15 a.m. EST The Group B lead (and top seed, I reckon) will be at stake when the Spaniards and Americans face off. However, a loss for either team wouldn't mean a ton. This might be the only team against which Team USA loses two starters' position battle: Jose Calderon could be better than Jason Kidd, and Pau Gasol might be closer to Carmelo Anthony than you'd think. Of course, the United States has better depth and stronger talent at the top, with LeBron and Kobe. Can Spanish camaraderie bridge the gulf and take Spain to a win? We'll see ... well, Eastern and Central time zone fans will see. Folks in the Mountain or Pacific time zones can either watch online at NBCOlympics.com or catch it on a tape delay. Awesome work, NBC!

SILVER: Croatia vs Lithuania, 2:30 a.m. EST The Croats finally dropped a match with a stinker against resurgent Argentina. Lithuania continues to ride high after salting the Argentines on the opening day, and along with only the U.S. and Spain remains undefeated. The guard battle should be excellent, and you'd suspect plenty of made threes here -- Croatia is still at 50% from deep on the tournament. Lithuania's Linas Kleiza has been an uber-efficient scorer and has pulled seven boards a game.

BRONZE: China vs Germany, 8:00 a.m. EST China could use a big win here to slip onto the path toward the medal round. Yao Ming really dominated against Angola (surprise). Chris Kaman and Dirk Nowitzki should impede the big China frontline a bit more. Both teams have questionable backcourt outfits, as we've said and seen and said again after seeing. Despite the 1-2 record, China's been good, hanging with the States for a hot minute and taking Spain to OT. Germany, however, followed its win over the Aussies with two double-digits losses ... and it hasn't met the U.S. yet. I'll guess China in an upset of minor proportions. (Actually, I might take a nap.)

In other action: Greece vs Angola, Russia vs Australia, Iran vs Argentina.

Throughout the Olympic men's basketball tournament, FanHouse will prioritize the games of the day for you in Golden Ticket.

Two heavyweight battles on the docket for the fourth day of the men's tournament, plus a couple other intriguing matchups.

GOLD: United States vs Spain, 10:15 a.m. EST The Group B lead (and top seed, I reckon) will be at stake when the Spaniards and Americans face off. However, a loss for either team wouldn't mean a ton. This might be the only team against which Team USA loses two starters' position battle: Jose Calderon could be better than Jason Kidd, and Pau Gasol might be closer to Carmelo Anthony than you'd think. Of course, the United States has better depth and stronger talent at the top, with LeBron and Kobe. Can Spanish camaraderie bridge the gulf and take Spain to a win? We'll see ... well, Eastern and Central time zone fans will see. Folks in the Mountain or Pacific time zones can either watch online at NBCOlympics.com or catch it on a tape delay. Awesome work, NBC!

SILVER: Croatia vs Lithuania, 2:30 a.m. EST The Croats finally dropped a match with a stinker against resurgent Argentina. Lithuania continues to ride high after salting the Argentines on the opening day, and along with only the U.S. and Spain remains undefeated. The guard battle should be excellent, and you'd suspect plenty of made threes here -- Croatia is still at 50% from deep on the tournament. Lithuania's Linas Kleiza has been an uber-efficient scorer and has pulled seven boards a game.

BRONZE: China vs Germany, 8:00 a.m. EST China could use a big win here to slip onto the path toward the medal round. Yao Ming really dominated against Angola (surprise). Chris Kaman and Dirk Nowitzki should impede the big China frontline a bit more. Both teams have questionable backcourt outfits, as we've said and seen and said again after seeing. Despite the 1-2 record, China's been good, hanging with the States for a hot minute and taking Spain to OT. Germany, however, followed its win over the Aussies with two double-digits losses ... and it hasn't met the U.S. yet. I'll guess China in an upset of minor proportions. (Actually, I might take a nap.)

In other action: Greece vs Angola, Russia vs Australia, Iran vs Argentina.

The incredibly too-quick fall of Larry Brown has been less mystery than curiosity. The bizarre departure from Detroit followed by the season from Hell in New York explain why L.B. became nearly untouchable in the NBA. But in a league of interminable chances, watching Brown twist in the wind as all sorts of struggling teams went with other options until MJ in Charlotte came calling ... that was weird.

Might Brown's abominable job with the 2004 Olympic team deserve more blame for the coach's castigation? Marc J. Spears indirectly makes that case in a Boston Globe feature on the 2008 team.

Along with being young and inexperienced, Team USA was mired with drama and immense pressure to win. Brown suspended [Allen] Iverson, [LeBron] James, and [Amare] Stoudemire during an exhibition game against Puerto Rico in Jacksonville, Fla., after they were late to a meeting. [Carmelo] Anthony acknowledged the incident was "the beginning" of the troubles for the 2004 team.

"We had a meeting and they were like three to five minutes late," Anthony said. "Coach Brown said they couldn't play. We were kind of shocked. A.I. can't play. Amare can't play. LeBron can't play. We thought it was hurting our team. So to start off like that, you could say it carried over."

Coaches in the NBA rarely get away with angering their stars -- hell, even nice-guy Dwight Howard probably had a major part in getting rid of Brian Hill last summer. So, even in an international competition, pissing off some of the brightest young superstars in the league is not a good idea. What role the Athens disaster had in Brown's downfall is unknown -- it preceded the Detroit drama. But it has certainly has shaped our new image of the legendary coach, and it's limited his relevancy going forward.

Lost in all this free agent signing and opting and what not is the fact that Dwyane Wade is all of sudden blogging for the Chicago Sun-Times. Wait, wait. Sorry. He's not blogging. He's diary-ing (which, as Eamonn points out, is similar to Mariotti's "mini-columns" in terms of incorrect nomenclature).

Nothing particularly spicy gets dropped in his first piece, but then again it's an Olympic Diary, so how intense can he get? Still, if Team USA experiences anything turmoil related, struggles or has any Real World scenarios, maybe we'll get lucky. Until then, finding out that LeBron is funny will have to do.

We have a team photo shoot Monday in New York and we did some kind of movie shoot in Vegas where we had to take it back to the early 70s with the poses we did. LeBron (James) was joking the whole time. We couldn't even stand in a straight line because LeBron was joking, Carmelo (Anthony) was joking and even Coach K (Mike Krzyzewski) cracked a couple of jokes.

One of the biggest complaints about the announcement of USA Basketball's 12-man roster is the lack of big men. We are sending just one true center (Dwight Howard) along with two true power forwards (Chris Bosh and Carlos Boozer).

There are quite a bit of guys that excel at slashing to the basket (Kobe Bryant, Dwyane Wade, LeBron James, Chris Paul, Deron Williams, Carmelo Anthony) ... who also need the ball in their hands a lot. We also will send a gutty, defensive point guard in Jason Kidd.

Hmmm. This sounds an awful like how Mike Krzyzewski ... coach of Team USA ... constructs his usual team: the Duke Blue Devils.

Anyone who has followed Duke knows that they team has really had issues with depth and talent in the frontcourt in recent years ... while running a bunch of same-sized players on the perimeter. It works alright for a while, but them crumbles as the season wears on.

It could happen in Beijing as the group that Team USA will be in is rather weak, but they will see the big dogs in single-elimination play.

When Joe Dumars put his entire roster on the block, he opened the door for a summer of crazy rumors. First came the Carmelo Anthony rumors, which became so rampant that 'Melo demanded an explanation from Denver's front office. Today's speculation du jour? Baron Davis to Detroit.

Geoff Lepper of the Contra Costa Times got the ball rollling by citing an unnamed source within the Warriors who indicates that the Pistons "are now looking at Davis" and would be willing to offer Chauncey Billups and Rasheed Wallace in return. In order to get the money right, Lepper speculates that Al Harrington, who's already thinking about requesting a trade, would be thrown into the mix.

As Tim Kawakami correctly notes, the Pistons would be getting the short end of the talent stick in a Davis/Harrington for Chauncey/Rasheed swap. Could the Warriors sweeten the pot by throwing in the 14th overall pick? Well, possibly, but this deal can't happen on draft day (read: tomorrow!) since Davis has until July 9 to decide if he's going to opt out of the final year of his contract. So unless the Warriors happen to pick someone the Pistons really like, that's a dead end, too.

In other words, there are simply too many moving parts in this deal to think everything could line up perfectly. Chris McCosky of the Detroit News called this rumor "a total fabrication." I won't go quite that far -- Lepper's source isn't just making things up for fun, right? -- but it's possible Detroit's interest has been exagerrated or distorted, much like their alleged "pursuit" of Anthony.