Hooped Up

Holy free agency Batman! Ron Artest has signed a reported three-year deal worth $18 million to join the Los Angeles Lakers.

“I’m definitely going to L.A. — to sign, yeah,” Artest said in a phone interview. “Lakers, Lakers, Lakers. I’m in L.A. right now.”

Artest said he met with Lakers owner Dr. Jerry Buss Thursday and previously had spoken with Lakers coach Phil Jackson. He was en route to his financial manager’s office, where he planned to huddle on the phone with his agent, David Bauman, to finalize details. ”I don’t really care about the money,” Artest said. “I’ll play there for nothing. … L.A. was very interested in me, and they got me.”

In about 3 months, the Rockets went from being the second best team in the west to being on the edge of the NBA lottery. Yao Ming is already done for next season, Tacy McGrady wants out and now Ron Artest is headed to the Lakers.

What else will go wrong in Houston I ask?

Via CBS Sports

Everybody else wants to pay Trevor Ariza more money than he’s worth, except for his current team the LA Lakers.

The Lakers remained far apart on negotiations Wednesday with their two main free-agent pieces, forwards Lamar Odom and Trevor Ariza. In particular, Ariza and his agent weren’t thrilled by the Lakers’ annual offer of $5.6 million over an unspecified number of years. Ariza, 24, was hoping for $7 million to $8 million a year. Odom, 29, is believed to be seeking $10 million a year, though it was unclear what the Lakers offered him. Ariza is drawing interest from Portland, Houston, Cleveland, Toronto and the Clippers. Of those teams, only Portland and Toronto have enough salary-cap room to offer more than the Lakers’ current offer.

Ariza was huge for the Lakers this season after Odom was injured and he had a great playoff run too. That being said, he is nowhere near worth $8 million a year and the Lakers would be better off letting somebody else over pay Ariza for services.

Call me crazy.

Via Los Angeles Times

This ain’t Wal-Mart! That’s what Trevor Ariza and his agent David Lee are saying about negotiating a re-signing with the Lakers when Ariza officially becomes a free agent tonight, because they will not give Lakers GM Mitch Kupchak a discount.

While Ariza has maintained that he hopes to wear purple and gold again next season, agent David Lee said Monday that the Lakers won’t receive any hometown discount from his client. Lee declined to reveal how much of a raise Ariza will seek when he becomes an unrestricted free agent Tuesday night at 9:01 p.m., but he said the young forward’s upside should make him the most coveted wing player on the market.

Among the teams Lee expects to pursue Ariza: Detroit, Portland and Toronto, franchises with enough cap space to more than double Ariza’s $3.1 million salary of last season.

Ultimately Ariza might  be too expensive for the Lakers because he’s got the free agent perfect storm going to get paid a lot of planetary credits. He’s young (24 years old), just won a championship, plays solid defence and GM’s see a lot potential in him.

If Scott Layden or Isiah Thomas were GM’s right now, they would offer Trevor Ariza a billion dollars and the Elephant Man’s bones to begin negotiations. But despite Zeke and Layden not having NBA GM jobs right now, Ariza is going to get paid large!

Via Press-Enterprise

Kobe Bryant was on The Conan O’Brien Show a few days ago, but it was only today that I found the full video with audio to post it. Not that I doubted your lip reading abilities or anything.

Now sit back and enjoy the word of the Black Mamba and the comedic styling of Conan O’Brien, you marvelous bastard.

Part 2 of Kobe Bryant’s interview after the jump.

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The Lakers are back on top and yesterday Kobe Bryant and the Lakers played show and tell with the Larry O’Brien trophy in front of thousands of fans yesterday at the Coliseum in Los Angeles. Sure Kobe Bryant had some interesting things to say when he addressed the crowd, but a Mark Madsen inspired dance would had been so much better instead.

Then again, only Mad Dog can dance like he hit his head on something.

Puppet Kobe finally won his 4th championship and he’s celebrating every chance he gets. Just not in from of puppet LeBron proving that even puppets have etiquette.

Now crank up the Montell Jordan and dust off that two step.

It was believed only one of them would stay, until the Lakers high-stepped through the last two weeks of the playoffs with relative ease, winning the last two games of the Western Conference finals against a physical, feisty Denver team before disposing of Orlando. The recent sentiment is that there might be room for both Trevor Ariza and Lamar Odom. Lakers Coach Phil Jackson even said as much last week, saying it wasn’t “written in stone” that the team would have to make an either/or decision with the two players. Basically, it comes down to owner Jerry Buss, who has stepped up financially numerous times over the years, most recently by signing Andrew Bynum to a four-year, $57.4-million contract extension last October and, before that, absorbing an extra $49 million in salary by acquiring Pau Gasol in February 2008.

Los Angeles Times

Kobe Bryant is officially one of the best players in the NBA of all-time. He’s won four NBA titles, an MVP trophy, a slam dunk title, two scoring titles, named an All-Star 11 times and even brought Brandy to his prom when Moesha was just about to jump off. Yet, Kobe Bryant may also be one of the most hated athletes in sports today.

Well, on Sunday after he won his first NBA finals MVP award handed to him by and named after Bill Russell and raised his first Shaq free Larry O’Brien trophy. More haters were born.

So if being one of the best is reason to hate somebody, you can officially hate Kobe Bryant now. If you’re a player congratulator, then cop the “You Can Hate Me Now” tee by K1X and let those haters choke on that Haterade they be guzzlin’ daily.

Oh sweetest NBA basketball, it’ll be hard to accept that the season is over and basketball action is dead for a few months. And let’s not count the summer league and pre-season weeks, because that’s not basketball it’s punishment. However, I will accept free tickets to either (reluctantly).

Anyway, here are the top 5 plays of the NBA finals and you’ll notice how every single top 5 play was in the Amway Arena and only one of the five clips was an Orlando Magic highlight. Kinda sums up the whole series, don’t it.

Wheaties has been apart of the NBA finals since pimpin’ been pimpin’ and before the champagne was done in the Lakers locker room. Wheaties unveiled  their latest box on the championship cereal track. Sun Yue and Adam Morrison should be happy that this was a team picture, otherwise everybody would assume they got their championship rings via eBay.

Somehow, I don’t think the General Mills marketing team had pre-printed Orlando Magic cereal boxes ready in the warehouse just in case.

Via Ball Don’t Lie