HOOPSWORLD | Basketball News & NBA Rumors

After struggling early, the HEAT did find their chemistry, and started a slow and steady rise towards the top of the Eastern Conference standings, yet despite their rise there were still nagging voices pointing out how little depth the team had, and that criticism played out when the HEAT took on the few teams who could also be considered contenders in their conference. Sure, having Dwyane Wade, LeBron James and Chris Bosh is great, but no team ever won a championship playing three-on-five.

Now, with the trade deadline behind us and the cutoff for waived players fast approaching, we’re seeing part two of HEAT President Pat Riley’s plan. Yesterday point guard Mike Bibby was granted his release from the Washington Wizards and by all accounts seems headed to Miami once he clears waivers (The HEAT have waived Carlos Arroyo to make room for him) and today the team is hot on the trail of a big man. Their true hope was to add Troy Murphy, but the Boston Celtics have whisked Murphy off the market. Now there’s talk the team might take a chance on Eddy Curry, which makes a little sense given their gaping hole in the middle (what, Erick Dampier wasn’t the answer?).

Fans love it when their favorite team’s owner is willing to spend like crazy. NBA fans in Boston, Los Angeles, Orlando and Dallas, particularly, are used to their teams making moved without much consideration for cost. Sometimes, however, being over the cap can cost you, as the Boston Celtics learned last week.

Oklahoma City Thunder GM Sam Presti has been biding his time, sitting on cap space, and waiting for just the right opportunity to use it. Last week he found that opportunity, trading Jeff Green to the Boston Celtics for Kendrick Perkins, and now signing Perkins to a four-year extension that was only possible because the Thunder were under the cap. When a team is under the cap they can give a player a raise any time they like, and in the case of Perkins the Thunder worked what amounted to a signing bonus of $2.6 million added to his current salary. With that bonus in place, his extension became worth more than it would have been in Boston, adding up to roughly $8.2 million per season over the next four years. 

When you consider that Perkins is one of the better starting centers in the NBA, particularly on the defensive end of the floor, that’s a heck of a steal for the Thunder. The Celtics could never have made such a deal, and the extra salary should help ease the sting of having to leave his buddies in Massachusetts. This deal also reinforces the reason we at HOOPSWORLD consistently rank Sam Presti as the top GMs in the league. His Thunder are set for the foreseeable future, and their path to the championship was just significantly shortened.

Kings Get Extension

The NBA Board of Governors has approved an extension of the deadline for the Sacramento Kings to file an application to relocate the team to a new market. The deadline, which is typically March 1 prior to the season for which a team wants to relocate, has now been moved to April 18 to give Kings ownership the opportunity to discuss its options with the NBA Board of Governors at its meeting on April 14-15.
 
The Spurs’ First Test 

This season the San Antonio Spurs have been the NBA’s top team from the word go, largely due to the superb play of Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili. The team’s dynamic backcourt duo have been fully healthy together for the first time in quite a while, and the result has been San Antonio meteoric return to dominance. The team that usually isn’t concerned with seedings or even home court advantage in the playoffs has been sitting comfortably atop the Western Conference standings. Head coach Gregg Popovich (and his peers, for that matter) points to the health of Parker and Ginobili as the reason for his team’s sustained success.

That being the case, the Spurs are about to face their first big test of the 2010-11 season. 

{AUTHOR_BOX}Tony Parker has been absolutely brilliant, perhaps spurred on by another summer of hearing his name come up in trade rumors.  He’s averaging 17.1 points and 6.6 assists per game while shooting 52% from the field and even 35% from three. His numbers are up across the board from last season and his production has helped Tim Duncan play more of a supporting role for the Spurs, but yesterday the Spurs got some news that will test their restored dominance. Parker will be out for 2-4 weeks due to a strained left soleus and is not accompanying the team on their road trip to Memphis and Cleveland.

The good news is the Spurs already have Parker’s part-time replacement on the roster, and George Hill has played so well in a reserve role that there has been talk of moving Parker to allow Hill to become the full-time starter. He will now move into the starting lineup and give Spurs management a chance to see in practice what they have considered in theory. Ultimately, though, the Spurs lose something with Parker not in the lineup and it will be interesting to see how they pick up the slack. Richard Jefferson will no doubt play a larger role in the offense now, and Duncan may need to log a few more minutes to make up for Parker’s defensive absence.