Sioux Falls coach Morris "Mo" McHone said D.J. Kennedy (with ball) is Erie's leader. He's searched for one with the Skyforce./Photo by Janet B. Kummerer/Erie Times-News

The Sioux Falls Skyforce have talent.

Anthony Mason Jr. can ball. So can Trey Gilder.

Marqus Blakely has some of the best hops I’ve ever seen in the D-League and Keith Benson is a solid big.

Sioux Falls has so much talent, it has Gabe Pruitt, a second-round pick of the Boston Celtics in 2007, coming off the bench, yet the Skyforce have the D-League’s worst record at 9-28. They’ve lost four in a row and eight of their last 10.

How is this possible?

“The reason our record is what it is the lack of leadership,” Sioux Falls coach Morris “Mo” McHone said. “We don’t have the chemistry. You can tell just by the way we act on the floor. We don’t congratulate each other.

“We don’t do those things and that’s one of the things we were talking about. We just don’t have that chemistry and the only way you’re going to get to chemistry, you got to have somebody take over and be responsible for doing it and we don’t have that. Haven’t had it.”

After losing twice in Erie this weekend, McHone said D.J. Kennedy is the leader of the BayHawks, but in his mind, he doesn’t have anyone who can take control of the game down the stretch.

“When things get bad and when teams are getting ready to make a run, you got to have somebody on your team that’s going to take over and we don’t have that,” he said. Read the rest of this entry »

In celebrating the rise of Jeremy Lin, the Erie BayHawks had a “Lin-Sanity Night” tonight in which they sold Lin/BayHawks merchandise that include replica home and away jerseys.

The BayHawks won, 110-98, against Sioux Falls, who has the D-League’s worst record at 9-27, but Erie coach Jay Larranaga didn’t like how his team played.

After the game, he made a point to say his team didn’t play Lin has since getting his shot with the New York Knicks after posting a triple-double in his one game with Erie. The Knicks are Erie’s NBA hybrid affiliate.

“This was supposed to be celebrating Jeremy Lin Night,” Larranaga said. “We didn’t play like Jeremy Lin plays. Jeremy Lin plays with an energy and he doesn’t participate in games like that because he raises the level of everyone else on his team to play a certain way. So that was disappointing.”

Erie had a pre-game video in which Lin addressed the crowd in his New York Knicks jersey, an “Lin-Sanity” seating section and a trivia quiz that had four questions about Lin:

1. Where he went to college? (Harvard)
2. How many points did he score in his first start with the New York Knicks? (28)
3. On the Lin Top 10 of ESPN’s SportsCenter, where was the BayHawks’ highlight? (3rd)
4. How many days between Lin’s game with Erie and his first start with the Knicks? (17)

NBA commissioner David Stern canceled more games through Nov. 30 after talks with the NBPA broke down Friday./AP Photo.

Yo D? What’s up guy? Haven’t seen you in a minute. What’s good?

Ah man. Nothing much. Staying busy. What’s good with you?

You know me, kid. I’m out just trying to do the right thing. So it looks like you’ve slimmed down some. Getting your run on?

Yeah man. Trying.

I hear you. I saw you one time darn near get trucked by a car over there by the hospital. I was like, ‘Yo, that looks like D right there.’ Got to wear brighter colors bruh. You know moms taught you to look both ways before crossing the street.

You right. You right.

Anyway, what’s up with this lockout man? The NBA has one of its greatest seasons in recent memory then just shut it down. What you think the problem is?

Dollars. It’s all about the dollar.

Got millionaires fighting over billions. I just heard they canceled games through the end of next month and there won’t be an 82-game season.

Yep. Well, NBA commissioner David Stern never says never, but he even admitted it’s not “practical” to have a full season. Shouldn’t have even tried to do that after canceling games earlier. Never understood trying to cram an 82-game season in.

Read the rest of this entry »

If the NBA stays in lockout mode for the entire season, I may miss the interviews more than the play and the players.

Having been in my share of NBA locker rooms and at my share of press conferences over the years, you have a good idea of what a player might say. Most use cliche lines like, “We played hard” or “We wanted to come out with great energy.”

But then there are those who throw caution to the wind and either say what pops in their head or what has been on their mind for so long that they can’t contain it anymore.

Now we’re going to get some real doozys if the lockout goes all season, but right now, check out some of the ones that have always left me either laughing, scratching my head or amazed.

Allen Iverson – “We talking about practice.”

I miss A.I.

Read the rest of this entry »

LeBron James is overseas on a promotional tour in Asia for Nike. He’s playing in a game, having fun and all the sudden finds himself in the middle of another one of his ”what’s up with that’ moment.

As you’ll see in the video below, this Asian kid dunks on him. Now before you check it out, you’re not going to hear canons sound off, but there are some special effects involving smoke. Just crazy.

We all know James could have blocked the dunk, but do you do that if you’re over there promoting? If anything bothered me, it was how he trying to be cute and got stripped. I’ll chalk it up as having fun, but sometimes, you just got to scratch your head with LeBron and say, well, it is what it is.

He can still throw it down.

Today at a fantasy camp for season ticket holders of the Charlotte Bobcats, Michael Jordan was asked if he can still dunk.

The guy is the G.O.A.T (Greatest Of All Time) of basketball, but he’s 48 years old. Father time does have a way of winning in the end.

But as you’ll see below, he can still dunk.

The question is, could Jordan help a team win a title? Could he average double figures in the NBA at age 48?

Thoughts?

Just came across Charles Barkley welcoming Shaquille O’Neal to TNT to work with Ernie Johnson, Kenny “The Jet” Smith and Chris Webber.

Still gonna need to clear some space on the desk for the Diesel, but Barkley basically told O’Neal he can’t upset Johnson, who is the host of the show.

“Second thing, pretty much nothing after that matters,” Barkley said. “Ernie is the man.”

With that being, we don’t want to see Barkley and O’Neal do this again. For those two to be athletes, they’ll never be mistaken for Muhammad Ali.

Back in Ohio ballin’ with his boys, LeBron James played in a game outside of Cleveland.

You’ll hear oohs and surprisingly, you won’t hear any boos.

Hmmm.

Some see this as the city forgiving James, but had he done this in the middle of a park in Cleveland and no one shouts something negative at him, then that’s a whole other story.

For now, this was entertaining.

Charlotte Bobcats' D.J. Augustin is an emerging star PG in the NBA./AP Photo

With the NBA in lockout mode, it may be easy to forget how the 2010-11 season reestablished the league as one of the best in pro sp0rts.

While the owners and players try to work things out, here’s a look at my five favorite players who I consider to be under the radar. They can play.

Just aren’t on TV enough for people to notice or they’re playing for bad teams or they’re part of a team that’s a playoff contender or they’re one of many who excel at the same position (Hint! Hint!).

Now I tried to avoid guys who have made the all-star team. That kept hem from including Al Hortford. Guy is an very good player, but teammates Joe Johnson, Josh Smith and even Jamal Crawford get more pub than him in Atlanta.

I could have put guys like Houston Rockets forward Luis Scola on there, but people talk so much about how underrated he is, we all know who is he now.

In closing, I really wanted to put Philadelphia 76ers forward Thaddeus Young on the list, but I want to see how he does with coach Doug Collins for another season. I love Young’s game.

Look for more Top 5′s from me at www.goerie.com/blogs/giveandgo.

Read the rest of this entry »

1. Eddie House was waiting for Daniel Gibson to come out the locker room. It took two security guards and teammate Carlos Arroyo to talk him into coming into the locker room.
2. Kept seeing Wally Szczerbiak walking around.
3. Said hello to TNT’s David Aldridge. Good guy.
4. Erik Spolestra kept talking about how his team handled this “extreme” situation. Called it a playoff atmosphere. He also said it was nice to see the team stand up and play well for LeBron James and Zydrunas Ilgauskas. Then he said he was told a battery was thrown at the Heat bench, but was confident in the security.
5. Saw Daniel Gibson leaving with his wife, singer Keyshia Cole. Hope he went the opposite way of the Heat bench.
6. Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert was heated. He walked out with the wind to his back.
7. Saw J.J. Hickson laughing after the game (Why, your team just got beat down).
8. Waiting for LeBron, D-Wade and Chris Bosh to do postgame in the open room Cleveland has. They use that area for the playoffs.
9. Then Miami’s Big 3 came out.
10. LeBron was asked all the questions expect one, which went to D-Wade.
11. In short, LeBron basically said he wasn’t going to apologize for doing the charity work for the kids in “The Decision” part. Said he lives with his decisions and has never regretted any decision he’s made. Said the execution of “The Decision” was a tad bit off. Talked about how the team played well. Continually said he had nothing against the Cleveland fans and understand they were going to do everything they could to help their team win. Said the Cavalier fans were not on his list of people who he was keeping a mental checklist. Said the chatter he had with the Cleveland teammates on the bench was fun for him (Doubt it was fun for the other team).
12. Then the Miami PR people cut the interview much to the dismay of ESPN’s Rachel Nichols. She was looking at them like, “Are you serious?” Then the Miami Big 3 walked out just as James used to do when he was with Cleveland.