It's Sunday which means it's time to take a look at what the wonderful world of the NBA taught us last week.

Jim Boeheim Has Melo's Back

Current Team USA assistant coach and Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim had some choice words last week for the Denver Nuggets with regard to the organization's decision to trade Marcus Camby to the Los Angeles Clippers.  

"Without Camby, I don't see any way that they can possibly win because he was a key guy for them," Boeheim told the Rocky Mountain News.  "Believe me, I watched at least 70 games they played, maybe more.  And he was a key guy.

"I don't know how you can let Marcus Camby go.  He was like the heart and soul of that team, when it comes to defense, protecting the basket and rebounding.  It's tough to replace him."

On the surface these comments may seem like one man just giving his opinion.  However, the reality of the situation is that Boeheim is defending his former player Carmelo Anthony without even saying his name.

The assumption by most is the Nuggets will be worse next season without Camby.  And with Camby not around, Anthony will be forced to take on more responsibility next season.  As a result, people are already posturing and spinning to avoid any possible fallout from a mediocre 2008-09 season.

If Boeheim really wanted to help Melo, what he would do is sit him down and tell him it really doesn't matter who Anthony is running with.  Instead, it's on Melo to be the unequivocal leader of the squad and make those around him better.  Crying about the loss of a player will only give Anthony another excuse to cling to should things not go as well as the Nuggets hope next season.

Ben Gordon Seeking Goofy Money

This week I heard something that almost made me fall out of my chair laughing.  I was told Ben Gordon's camp believes he's better than Allen Iverson and therefore deserves to be paid accordingly.

I still chuckle reading that last sentence out loud.

There's no doubt Gordon has some skills, and the six-year $61 million the Bulls are reportedly offering seems more than fair.  However, Gordon wants a deal in the neighborhood of $80 million over six years.

Let's look at the reality of this situation.  Gordon is an undersized two-guard who can score the rock a little bit.  However, he's not a great defender and hasn't even sniffed an All-Star berth yet.  How in the world do you pay a guy like that $80 million?

Gordon should be happy the Bulls are offering him $60 million, and he should sign that deal without thinking twice.  Instead, he appears intent on trying to force a sign-and-trade.  The only problem with that is there likely isn't another team in the league who would pay him $80 million, either.  Not only that, but the Bulls wouldn't likely sign off on such a deal because they wouldn't want to take that much salary back in return.

Seriously, someone needs to shake Gordon.  Take the Bulls' offer and end the madness today, Ben.

Kaman Has Daddy Issues

Does anyone else understand that Olympics are just a business?  Yes, this may sound cynical, but it's also true.  As such, it would be nice if people would lay off my man Chris Kaman.  People are acting like he's a modern day Benedict Arnold or something.

"I'm happy with my decision," Kaman told the LA Times last week.  "I'm still an American citizen.  I still play in the NBA.  I still live in Los Angeles.  I'm still from Michigan.  I just chose to go with my heritage a little farther back and see if they'd allow me to play for them and I did."

Kaman's grandparents were born in Germany, thus allowing him to participate this summer, so if anyone would be supportive of Kaman's decision one would have to of assumed it would have been his family.  As it turns out, not so much.  Kaman indicated his father wasn't doing cartwheels over his son's decision to represent Germany.

Kaman said his father told him: "You're not German, you're American."

"He said, 'When you're playing the USA, I'm going for USA, basically,'" Kaman said. "He didn't want to support me when I played the USA.  He said, 'I hope the USA beats you.'

"My mom is like, 'I want Germany to win.'

"He's proud of me no matter what I do, but at first he was a little surprised at what was going on."

Rough times when even your own father is questioning your decision.  At the end of the day, though, Kaman has said again and again that this move was simply about getting a chance to play basketball this summer.

Sorry to rain on the parade of all of the Olympic idealists, but this is about basketball and has never been about patriotism.

Get over it.

Sarunas The Revisionist

When Sarunas Jasikevicius left the Association it was a relief to scribes like your friendly neighborhood columnist simply because of the fact we wouldn't have to try and remember how to spell the dude's name anymore.  Aside from that, though, it's really too bad things didn't work out better for Jasikevicius in the NBA.

While some may not remember, he played fantastic basketball against the United States in international competition during the early part of this decade.  I remember watching him play and wondering aloud to myself how an NBA team hadn't yet made an offer.

Eventually an offer came, but Jasikevicius never really hit his stride in the league.  And this week, he was very honest about his feelings toward his former head coach in Indiana, Rick Carlisle.

"I was pretty much miserable (in Indiana)," Jasikevicius told the Indianapolis Star.  "Those were bad times for me.  Obviously."

Jasikevicius then proceeded to light into Carlisle.

"Obviously, the (up-tempo) style of play Rick promised me was never there, the opportunities to play were never there, and the players who were supposed to be gone by the time I came were still around.  Rick did a great false recruiting job on me, like college recruiting where they say: 'If you come here, we promise you the world.'"

Umm... am I the only one who remembers Jasikevicius also spent a season and a half in Golden State playing under Don Nelson and often failed to get off the pine there, too?  The same Don Nelson who just so happens to allow his players to play as "up-tempo" a style as any coach in today's game?

I guess a little revisionist history never hurt anyone.

The bottom-line is some guys just aren't a good fit for the NBA, and unfortunately that appears to be the case for Jasikevicius.  And what we're going to find out as more and more NBA guys migrate overseas is that some NBA players just aren't going to be a good fit for the international style of play, either.  It's not necessarily anyone's fault, it's just the reality of doing business in a global market place with drastically different styles of play.

It Ain't Easy Being Bobby Jones

I'll put this out on the table up front: I love Bobby Jones.  I got a chance to know him a little bit last season during his two stints with the Denver Nuggets.  He's one of those players who maybe isn't the most talented, but he gives it his all every second he's out on the floor.

The good news is Jones continues to find NBA work.  The bad news is he can't seem to find work in one place for very long.

Jones spent the entire 2006-07 season with the Philadelphia 76ers appearing in 44 games.  Seems like a normal career thus far, right?

Well, it was just prior to the 2007-08 season when things started to get crazy for Jones when he was traded to the Denver Nuggets along with Steven Hunter for Reggie Evans and the draft rights to Ricky Sanchez.  Jones played with the Nuggets through January until he was waived by the team shortly before his contract was scheduled to become guaranteed.

Jones was then signed by the Memphis Grizzlies where he played in nine games two of which he was in the staring lineup before being waived.  Next it was off to Houston where he made four appearances before being waived by the Rockets.  Shortly thereafter, he was picked up by the Miami HEAT where he made six appearances before being waived.  He was then picked up by the San Antonio Spurs where he made three appearances before... you guessed it... being waived.

As if that wasn't crazy enough, before last season concluded Jones was picked up by another team.  Thing is, that team was the Denver Nuggets, the team that, of course, had cut him just four months earlier.

Anyone else gone cross-eyed yet?

Jones' journey didn't end there, though.  When the Nuggets re-signed Jones last April, it was for the rest of the 2007-08 season with a non-guaranteed deal for the 2008-09 season.  Guess Jones could exhale for a minute, right?

No such luck. 

The Nuggets traded Jones along with Taurean Green to New York for Renaldo Balkman last month.  Of course, all the Knicks were trying to do was clear salary cap space in the deal so New York promptly waived Jones.

As you might have expected, though, Jones was picked up again earlier this month by the Miami HEAT.  Yes, the same Miami club that had waived him just a few months earlier.  The craziest part of this whole deal?  The HEAT turned around and waived him again earlier this week.

You understood that correctly.  Miami picked him up in the offseason, held on to him for a few days, and then waived him before he ever had a chance to even get an official practice under his belt.

So let's do the math here.  In the last calendar year Jones made nine different stops with seven different teams. 

It ain't easy being Bobby Jones. 

Of course, if history is any indicator, another one of his former teams will likely come calling very shortly.