Grant Hill has decided to stay with the Phoenix Suns despite the opportunity to win a championship with the Boston Celtics and the 8 digit numbers the New York Knicks threw at him.

The Boston Celtics enticed Hill not with cash but an opportunity for the veteran to win a Championship trophy. Seeing as how Grant Hill was earning only $1.9 million each of the last 2 years and rightfully felt he deserved more money, something told me he wasn’t going to take this option.

The New York Knicks had a little bit more to work with and they offered Hill either a 1 year deal worth $5 million or a 3 year deal worth $10 million. Eight figures gave me enough to doubt Hill would be choosing to stay in Phoenix despite teammate Steve Nash asking him to stay. I felt that honors in the dollar, kid.

Continue discussing Grant Hill deciding to stay with the Phoenix Suns.

The San Antonio Spurs have agreed to sign Marcus Haislip for the 2009-2010 NBA season. The Spurs are not capable of of signing him just yet and must wait until after the league-wide moratorium on off-season roster moves is lifted on Wednesday, July 8th. The terms of the deal are currently unknown. Full Story

Rasheed Wallace has reportedly chosen to sign a 2 year deal with the Boston Celtics instead of the Orlando Magic. The Orlando Magic were reported to be very interested in Wallace but Sheed wasn’t interested in playing with the former Eastern Conference Champions who recently acquired Vince Carter.

As if that wasn’t enough heartbreak for the Orlando Magic, Howard The Dunk reports Turkoglu turns down a Magic deal. The Magic reportedly offered Hedo Turkoglu a deal worth $45 million over the course of five years. Instead, Hedo will head up North to Toronto where he will play for the Raptors. And I’m with Raptor talk in this one. I too will enjoy laughing at Shawn Marion’s expense. He must now find a team willing to pay him the mid level exception.

When the NBA world found out that the Celtics heart and soul Kevin Garnett was probably out for the whole playoffs, everyone thought the Celtics were in big trouble. Full Story

Rajon Rondo will not be suspended for game 7 of the dramatic first round series between the Chicago Bulls and Boston Celtics reports Tom Ziller. During the game, Rajon Rondo flung Chicago Bulls shooting guard Kirk Hinrich into the scorers table. Full Story

Time and time again the Celtics vs. Bulls series has proven itself to be the best of the 2009 NBA playoffs. More often then not, the Celtics and Bulls have ended up playing overtime in this round 1 series. The games always seems to be close and the winner can never be decided until late 4th quarter. Full Story

Rajon Rondo

Rajon Rondo’s performance against the Bulls has been nothing short of incredible yet he’s not getting that much love, well, considering he’s 0.3 assists off averaging a triple double.

He’s putting up 22ppg which I’m sure none of us expected him to come close to before the series considering he averaged half that during the regular season. 22ppg, that’s more than guys like Chris Paul, Deron Williams, Carmelo Anthony who are often talked about when discussing the best scorers in the league

He’s averaging more rebounds than the top-tier big men such as Yao Ming, Pau Gasol, Tim Duncan, Josh Smith and many more. Despite those guys being over one foot taller than Rajon Rondo.

He’s even dishing out more assists than everyone except CP3 & D-Will at 9.7 but he is averaging around 2 less turnovers per game than both of those guys.

This is one of the best Playoff performances I have ever seen yet he still isn’t getting as much hype as if someone like Dwyane Wade or LeBron James were to do this same thing. Why? Rondo should be on the front page of all the websites and blogs that have anything to do with Sports and when you open the front page of the Sports section in your newspaper, you should see Rondo’s face.

The thing that makes this performance even more amazing is that during the regular season he was just an average point guard and he’s now suddenly turned into what looks like a young Oscar Robertson. If there was an award for the Most Improved player during the playoffs, there wouldn’t even need to be a vote.

Rajon Rondo has really stepped up and taken this Boston team on his shoulders while they are missing their leader and whether or not Boston wins this series, if Rondo keeps this play up I think it’s going to go down as one of the best performances in NBA Playoff history.

So the Chicago Bulls currently trail the Boston Celtics 2-1 with game 4 today, however they could just as easily lead 2-1 as Game 2 was won at the buzzer.

Possibly the most interesting thing about this series is Chicago are playing without one of their best players, Luol Deng. This is a factor that many (including myself) may have forgotten about considering how well the Bulls have been playing without him.

Providing they can get past Boston and Deng is back to full strength for the 2nd round, which is when he is expected to return, will Deng be able to help Chicago take down the winner of the Philadelphia-Orlando series?

Both Philly and Orlando have shown they are far from perfect and can easily be beaten if you exploit their weaknesses with both teams often struggling for long periods in the game. This can be seen from the huge runs each team makes, most notably, Philadelphia going down by 18 in Game 1 and managing to come back and win. Both teams have been very inconsistent.

However, that is not taking into account the injuries which have been nagging at Hedo Turkoglu and Rashard Lewis, if they manage to get back to 100%, I can’t see Chicago standing a chance.

Chicago match-up very well with Philadelphia and both teams are carried mostly by their guards. Chicago will be able to throw double teams at Iguodala because of the 76ers lack of outside shooters. They have good defenders who should be able to make it hard for Iguodala and force him to take bad shots. On the inside, Philadelphia doesn”t really have any dominating post scorers. Thaddeus Young is their best however Tyrus Thomas will match-up with him a lot of the time, which would be a very interesting match-up.

If they were to face Orlando, assuming Lewis and Turkoglu still aren’t 100%, Chicago’s main focus would obviously be Dwight Howard. This makes it a lot harder for them to defend him as they can throw multiple defenders at him without having to worry too much about Orlando’s outside shooters. The Bulls also have the personnel be able to control Courtney Lee who has had a great series against the 76ers.

Chicago has given the defending champion Celtics a run for their money (albeit without Kevin Garnett) but nonetheless this team is no pushover. This Celtics team is of similar ability to the 76ers or the depleted Magic. So could the return of Luol Deng help the Bulls get to the Conference Finals? I think it is definitely a possibility.

It is all going to depend on how long it takes Deng to get back to his old self because we all know most players don’t return from injury and play like they did before they left. If Deng is able to come back and contribute it will give Chicago that 3rd scorer (as well as Gordon & Rose) so that when they can’t make a shot like in Game 3, Deng can shoulder the load.

On the other end of the spectrum, the return of Deng could have a negative effect on this Bulls team. Early in the season, a few players were unhappy with the amount of playing time they were getting, most notably Larry Hughes who has since been traded, but over the past month or so and the first 3 games of the Playoffs, the Bulls seem to have got everything just right with everyone getting the time they expect. When Deng returns are they still going to be able to keep everyone happy? Who knows. That’s been one of the things that has helped Chicago play so well. They’ve been playing as a team and different players have stepped up when they were needed. The last thing they need is for their players to be unhappy. If a player is unhappy they aren’t going to be as productive in the time they do get on the court.

So, if Chicago does manage to pull off an upset over Boston could they go on even further? Could we see this team in the Conference Finals? Even if they are eliminated by Boston, you can’t help but wonder how different things would be had Luol Deng been healthy.

2009 NBA Playoffs

It has been 8 days since the 2009 NBA playoffs began and the most interesting series we have is between the Chicago Bulls and the Boston Celtics. I don’t care if you’ve been a Lakers fan for the past 30 years, watching the Lakers methodically bully the Jazz isn’t exciting. The only way for the Jazz to win a game that series is to come out with some truly amazing effort and hit every single open shot they get, and then a good half of their contested shots.

Dallas is manhandling the Spurs without Ginobili and an unhealthy Tim Duncan. Denver is playing against a team that already seems to have vacation plans. Houston and Portland can get interesting but there really just isn’t a storyline to get hyped up about with this matchup. If you can think of one let me know because I’d like some excitement or at least something to help keep my interest up while watching these games.

In the east we have the Cavaliers running over the Pistons. Two years ago this matchup was made for the ages but these are two different teams. The Pistons are falling apart and the Cavaliers are as solid as ever. The 76ers are somehow holding their own against Dwight Howard and the Magic and lead the series 2-1 despite having an overall -5 point differential for the 3 games.

After the Heat lost to the Hawks by 24 in the first game, Dwayne Wade and company decided to step it up winning the next two games by an average of 22. Wade scored just 19 points in the first game then went off, as we all expected, to score 33 in game two and 29 in game three.

Predictable Outcomes Make for Terrible Playoffs

The Los Angeles Lakers are essentially expected to win at least 12 playoff games this year. That puts them in the finals. Anything less than that is going to shock the nation and might just make things a bit more interesting. The Lakers of the last two years have increased their ability to move the ball dramatically. Various reasons have put the Lakers in the forefront of the western conference. Part of it was acquiring Pau Gasol from the Memphis Grizzlies for Kwame Brown. That single move actually hit two birds with one stone because getting rid of Kwame Brown and his negative overall impact was helpful to the team as well.

The combined loss of Manu Ginobili and Tim Duncan’s health are too much for the Spurs to take out the Lakers. Portland is too new. Houston is too injured. The Mavs are too dodgy, though, they might make it interesting.

The only team that was expected to be a challenge this year for the Cavaliers was the Orlando Magic who are currently not looking like they really want to prove it. The Celtics can’t do it without KG. The Bulls are too young but could provide for some excitement.

Earlier this season I expected the Heat to be a lot better than they were. With Marion/O’neal and their Number 2 Draft Pick Beasley combined with a healthy Dwyane Wade I really expected the Heat to be able to be a legitimate contender in the East. The fact is that O’neal is too old to dominate the game like he used to and Beasley just didn’t come out the gate nearly as strong as I expected.

Watching the inevitable is like watching paint dry. You know what’s going to happen. You know the likely outcome.

The Best Playoff Series

And here we are, back to the Boston Celtics and Chicago Bulls match up. This is what we have to cherish. The battle of the old and experienced (minus 1) who still know how to get things done vs. The young, talented and hungry. There is no way I could make a legitimate attempt at describing how exciting this series is without seriously violating some copyright laws so instead, you should all go check out why Bill Simmons wrote Celtics-Bulls is one for the ages.

The Payoff

Unlike previous years where we legitimately had multiple teams fighting to make it to the NBA Finals, we are left with just two, the Lakers and the Cavaliers. It may prove to be one of the best Finals match ups of the decade. With the ultimate battle between LeBron James and Kobe Bryant taking place in the biggest spotlight, we may very well be left with one redeeming factor for how unexciting the 2009 NBA playoffs have been so far.

With the Kobe vs. LeBron (or Kobe vs. Jordan) arguments taking place all over the internet, we might actually get to see the two go up head to head with a chance to add more gas to the flamewars.

The fact still remains that the playoffs don’t consist of the Lakers and Cavaliers (make it 4 with the Bulls and Celtics). Unless we see some more interesting story lines begin to develop, this has to go down as one of the worst NBA Playoffs ever. It’s either that or I’m just an angry Suns fan.