Rewind to the summer of 2014. Coach Mike Krzyzewski just led the U.S. Olympic Men’s National Team to a gold medal in what was a year of transformation for the squad. This marked its first round of high-stakes international play without the marquee sure things
Sep 07, 2017 by Adam Spinella in Player Breakdowns
Talking about the NBA as a business isn’t an ideal way for diehard supporters to wrestle with their fandom. But understanding how decisions are made on the technical side helps contextualize the choices organizations make about their franchise’s favorite players. Money matters, revenue allows the
Aug 30, 2017 by Adam Spinella in Team Breakdowns 
It might be the single-greatest team statistic in all of professional sports. And yet, we rarely talk about the context of how much is loaded within the particular piece of trivia. Even after digestion, the fact is hard to fully digest. Five. That’s the number
Aug 24, 2017 by Adam Spinella in Team Breakdowns
For all its complexities, the NBA salary-cap rules are fairly easy to navigate from a theoretical standpoint. The league and the NBA Players Association both want to encourage spending on player salaries, which is why a soft cap (one that can be exceeded) is in
Aug 17, 2017 by Adam Spinella in Uncategorized 
A team is only as strong as its weakest link. Log onto Twitter and you can see self-indulgent debates left and right about the superstars on a team. Is Team A’s best player better than Team B’s? Can Team A win a championship with Player
Aug 11, 2017 by Adam Spinella in Player Breakdowns 
I love the old coaching paradigm: Spacing is offense, and offense is spacing. It sounds so simple and downright obvious, especially when most who have played or watched basketball know the importance of the three-point shot these days. As evident as it may be, so
Aug 07, 2017 by Adam Spinella in Team Breakdowns 
Seventeen. Seventeen minutes is all Dwight Howard could conjure during fourth quarters of a six-game postseason series against the Washington Wizards this spring. Seventy-two minutes possible, 17 played. Two games saw him not even make a final-period appearance for the Atlanta Hawks during their first-round
Aug 03, 2017 by Adam Spinella in Player Breakdowns
Read any sophisticated basketball article these days and you’ll see variations of the same thing: Big guys have to do more than just be big in the modern NBA. Consider last year’s draft class. One rookie big put up per-36-minute averages of 15.6 points, 7.2
Jul 25, 2017 by Adam Spinella in Player Breakdowns