Indiana Pacers reserve Lance Stephenson has made a name for himself twice in his NBA career. First, in 2010, he was arrested after shoving his girlfriend down a flight of stairs and then slamming her head against the bottom step as he left the home. While that’s hard to top, he reminded us that he still exists during Game 3 of the Eastern Conference semifinals, as he wrapped his hands around his throat to tell LeBron James what he thought of him.

As many people expected, Stephenson’s tactics had two results: 1) He caused James to explode for a combined 70 points in Games 4 and 5 to push the Heat to a 3-2 series lead, and B) The Heat’s role players were going head-hunting. Sure enough, Udonis Haslem and Dexter Pittman reminded the Pacers that they’re going to be disrespected underdogs for just a little bit longer.

First, Haslem laid a vicious hit on Tyler Hansbrough that earned the Heat big man a flagrant 1, but Pittman took the top prize with less than 20 seconds left in the game and a 27-point lead. Pittman could have just gone for an easy rebound, but he instead decided to rock Stephenson in the shoulder and neck with his elbow for a little, as the kids call it, how-do-you-do.

Needless to say, Pittman will likely be enjoying the rest of the playoffs from a couch, otherwise Metta World Peace might destroy a village.

Read the rest of this entry »

This video (courtesy of That NBA Lottery Pick) is one of the least exciting we’ve ever posted, but it’s newsworthy because LeBron James read Young Adult super-novel The Hunger Games before Sunday’s Heat-Pacers Game Four in Indianapolis, dropped 40 points and evened the series at two games apiece. It’s the best remedial reading basketball performance since Vlade Divac cried his way through Island Of The Blue Dolphins and won gold at the ’89 European Championships.

Knowing what we know about LeBron, it makes sense that nothing would pump him up like stories of children being forced to murder each other. I also hope he’s illiterate and the book is just a bunch of pictures of Jennifer Lawrence with a bow and arrow. Regardless (and as tired a point to make as it is), you can only come down so much on a popular sports role model for reading an actual book on camera. I’m gonna guess Alex Rodriguez hasn’t read printed text since he was ten.

I want LeBron to make reading cool again. I also want to see it get to the point where he’s filmed reading Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye before a game and spends the first three quarters just lying in the middle of the court.

A for effort, but it doesn't make much sense.

Dwyane Wade was pissed that the Indiana Pacers were celebrating their Game 2 win in Miami earlier this week, and he was pissed that the refs weren’t calling fouls the way he’d prefer. So when most people expected him to respond with a Dwyane Wade game in Indiana last night, he shocked everyone when he barely showed up with a Harold Miner game. Wade scored 5 whole points as the Pacers trounced the Heat 94-75, and the “haters”, I believe, are throwing a parade in every major city this morning.

It’s just one game, and unless the Heat lose the next one, I think it’s safe to say the notion of the Heat being in panic mode is a bit silly and premature. But for at least one night, the people who have begged and prayed for the Heat to lose were celebrating their butts off on Twitter. And my favorite Tweet, which I assume was meant to mock all of the people Tweeting incredibly nasty comments at Wade and the Heat, came from Wade’s girlfriend, Gabrielle Union.

Read the rest of this entry »

"Hey you kids, get off my damn lawn!"

With less than 10 minutes to play in the 4th quarter of last night’s Game 2 matchup between the Miami Heat and Indiana Pacers, Dwyane Wade got a little pissed. Pacers guard Dahntay Jones seemingly went up-and-down on Wade (I knew a girl in college who mastered that) but the Heat star wasn’t too pleased that the refs didn’t call a foul. So he stood there and let the Pacers score.

As Mario Chalmers brought the ball back down, the Pacers forced a turnover and Wade was pretty much fed up. He sprinted after Darren Collison and jacked him in the back for a flagrant-1 and the title of the Dirtiest Player Not Named Metta World Peace. The Pacers went on to win Game 2 78-75, impossibly stealing one on the road, and they celebrated as such.

Just another thing that pissed Wade off.

“I heard they wanted to be like the Dallas Mavericks, in a sense,” Wade said. “I saw their little celebration at the end of (Game 2). I don’t know if they didn’t expect to win, but every night we go out on the court, we expect to win.” [...] “They say their identity, they say they want to be like Dallas,” Wade said. “So they celebrated like Dallas, I guess.” (Via Slam Online)

I understand that the guy’s going to be a little ticked when he feels like things didn’t go his way, even if he did, you know, miss a chance to swing the final score in his team’s favor. But whereas LeBron James never felt comfortable with the role of a villain, it seems like Wade has just fully embraced it and added, “F*ck it, we’re turning this up to 11.”

Read the rest of this entry »

Indiana Pacers forward Tyler Hansbrough is the prototypical love him or hate him player. He’s energetic, intense and borderline obnoxious on the court, so fans of the team he plays for love him and those he plays against hate him. In the Pacers’ first round series against the Orlando Magic alone, he showed that even though his numbers are low coming off the bench, he contributes best by getting into opponents’ heads and causing them to make mistakes.

I’m also the perfect example of a basketball fan who typically hates Hansbrough, because I find his intensity more arrogant than infectious. But during this first round series, in which his Pacers defeated the Magic 4 games to 1, I learned to respect him more than I ever have. Originally, I thought that Hansbrough was just a mouth-breathing dolt, grunting and derping his way through games and awkwardly lunging for undeserved chest bumps and high fives.

I’ve now learned, though, that there’s so much more emotional and intellectual depth to this athletic warrior and I want to pay tribute to Hansbrough in order to once and for all crush the misconception that he’s anything but a winner.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Orlando Magic and Indiana Pacers have one of the more understated and heated rivalries building in the NBA, but nobody really talks about it because it’s the Magic and the Pacers. Yawwwwwwwwn, amiright? Speaking of yawns, Danny Granger and a few of his Pacers teammates are probably a little tired this morning since they were out partying in Orlando until 2:45 a.m. Big deal, because I’ll bet Chris Duhon is still out drinking right now.

But it is a bit of a big deal, because while leaving Club 23, Pacers backup center Kyrylo Kesenko was confronted by some Orlando “fans” – and I use quotes because at 2:45 a.m. they’re really just random assh*les looking for a fight – and one even pushed the 7-footer. Then all heck broke loose. Heck, I say!

More from TMZ, “As Kyrylo tried to walk away from the situation … the mob grew in numbers and the taunts became louder.

That’s when Kyrylo’s teammate Danny Granger charged towards the clubgoer … only to be restrained by some of his friends.” (Via TMZ and their ridiculous love for ellipses.)

I’ve included the poor quality cell phone cam video of the altercation after the jump, and I think TMZ is making Granger out to be a bit more badass than he actually he is. Either way, I’m not one to preach about grown men knowing better than to go out partying, but if you’re as recognizable as Granger or, better yet, you’re a 7-foot European dude, people are probably going to talk sh*t.

I know I would. But from like two blocks away, because I’m not stupid.

Read the rest of this entry »