June 2008 Archives

USC's O.J. Mayo was taken by Minnesota at No. 3 with Kevin Love of UCLA going to spots later to Memphis at 5 in the first round of the NBA Draft tonight (hey, it's in the a.m. in New York City right now, of course).

But I've learned from informed NBA sources that the Trojan and Bruin will soon be swapping NBA destinations.

According to the sources, Minnesota will send the rights to Mayo, along with current Timberwovles Marko Jaric, Greg Buckner and Antoine Walker, to Memphis in exchange for the rights to Love and current Grizzlies Mike Miller, Jason Collins and Brian Cardinal.

So maybe Mayo and Love can look each other up before the early morning turns to late morning in Manhattan, and exchange those hats they wore while shaking hands with David Stern Thursday night!

It's a wrap on Round 1, with the Boston Celtics (surprisingly) taking 6-5 J.R. Giddens from New Mexico (after a two-year stop at Kansas that included some off-the-court well-documented issues). He's a talent, though.

Looking back . . . a record ten freshmen were selected . . . and seven were tabbed by way of the Pac 10.

The biggest surprises (going in the first round): Hill to San Antonio and Giddens to Boston.

The biggest surprises (not going in the first round): Mario Chalmers, Chris Douglas-Roberts and DeAndre Jordan.

Well, the draft-night agony is over for Darrell Arthur.

New Orleans (using the pick that has already been traded to Portland) tabbed the Kansas sophomore after he'd sweated things out for a couple of hours.

Now his mom is being interviewed on ESPN by Doris Burke. This is painful.

Let's hope the kidney thing doesn't prove to be serious.

Three picks to go . . .

Eighty-three percent of the first round has been chosen. You like that quick math?

The kid from the Congo who is playing in Spain (Serge Ibaka) was picked by Seattle but he'll stay in Spain until he learns how to play.

And Houston will do the same thing with the guy they draft (keep him overseas, that is) in 6-8 Nic Batum of France. He reminds me a little bit of Josh Childress.

Poor Darrell Arthur. He's the last guy standing (uh, sitting) in the Green Room. And his Kansas teammate, Mario Chalmers (you know him; he hit the 3 that sent the NCAA title game with Memphis into overtime) is yet to be selected either.

There are seven more picks to go in the first round; they'll be picked (I think).

Courtney Lee of Western Kentucky (to Orlando at No. 22, as I projected) and Kosta Koufos (the ninth freshman chosen; to Utah at No. 23) went about where I thought they would, they are happy to know.

The Hornets, at No. 20, made a nice "futures commodities) selection in a 7-foot, 20-year-old from France, Alexi Ajinca.

He's thin as heck but he is also going to spend two or three years playing in Europe before he joins Charlotte. Eat a lot of rich food, big guy.

At 19 was a solid pick for Cleveland in J.J. Hickson, the power forward from North Carolina State and the eighth freshman tabbed. He's going to be very good, fairly quickly.

And, as I projected at No. 21, New Jersey bags the seventh Pac 10 kid in Ryan Anderson, one of the best shooters in this draft pool.

The Nets' fans should be giddy right now!

Slipped away from the laptop for a few minutes to make popcorn . . . which is a much better bargain than buying it at the movies . . .

As I projected, Florida sophomore Marreese Speights went to Philly at No. 16, then Roy Hibbert, a 7-1 center from Georgetown who plays about 6-1 at times, went to Toronto at 17 (the Raptors will ship him to Indiana as part of the Jermaine O'Neal) and Washington took 6-11 JaVale McGee of Nevada, a sophomore who worked out poorly for most of the teams that took a long look at him. He dropped out of the first round on my final mock. But what do I know?

Phoenix has the center for its future (whenever Shaq What's His Name packs it in and becomes a full-time rapper) thanks to its selection of the other half of the Lopez Twins, Robin.

He'll have a better NBA career than four or five of the guys who were picked before he was.

The Warriors selected Anthony Randolph of LSU. I don't get that one. He's 2-3 years away from being ready to play quality NBA minutes . . . if he ever gets to that point.

They should have picked Robin Lopez of Stanford.

The Kings pull the trigger on the first senior to go in the first round: 6-10, 250-pound Jason Thompson of Rider(s on the Storm) College.

He's a good addition to Spencer Hawes up front.

Portland went for Brandon Rush of Kansas at No. 13 but I think the Blazers are sending to Rush to the Pacers (they really want Rush) for Bayless (that's who Portland wanted but the Blazers knew Sacramento would take him at No. 12), plus veteran PG Jarrett Jack.

Makes sense . . .

Jerryd Bayless of Arizona became the fifth Pac 10er (and sixth freshman) chosen when the Pacers bagged him at No. 11.

He sure didn't look really happy for a new millionaire, did he, when he went up to shake Stern's paw?

That's because he thought he was going to go as early as No. 4 and no later than No. 7.

Such is life, Jerryd.

Look at this way:

You're rich. You're in the NBA. And you're young.

Life doesn't get much better.

The New Jersey Nets just pulled off the biggest steal of the first round at No. 10 in bagging Brook Lopez of Stanford. I thought there was a great chance he would go No. 3 or 4. He'll start from Day 1 for the Nets.

That means there were four Pac 10 guys selected among the first 10 . . .

The speculation was that new coach Larry Brown isn't a fan of Charlotte Bobcats' point guard Raymond Felton.

That was verified with the Bobcats somewhat surprisingly made Texas point guard D.J. Augustin their pick at No. 9.

Brook Lopez of Stanford and Jerryd Bayless of Arizona are sliding . . .

Joe Alexander has been penciled in as the guy Milwaukee wanted at No. 8 and, guess what . . . that's who the Bucks picked.

He'll team with newly acquired Richard Jefferson to give new coach Scott Skiles a couple of pretty good wings.

There is absolutely giddiness in the Clippers' Staples Center offices right now . . . they got the guy they really wanted (after O.J. Mayo, that is) . . . and they didn't have to move up to do it!

Eric Gordon isn't going to solve their point guard issues but he will give them another quality scorer.

As expected, Knicks pick Danilo Gallinari from Italy . . .

And the Clippers will take Eric Gordon of Indiana, without having to make the deal with Seattle after all!

So much for the rumor that Memphis officials were concerned about Kevin Love's knees . . . maybe the Grizzlies didn't want Minnesota to pick him at 3, eh?

The Clippers are going to get someone good at 7 . . .

. . . and, as expected, Miami takes Michael Beasley, Minnesota takes O.J. Mayo and, in a bit of a surprise, Seattle takes Russell Westbrook of UCLA.

Congratulations to Russell . . . he's as solid a kid as I've ever written about.

I was just on the PMS show on 570 a.m. . . .

NBA commissioner David Stern will make it official any moment . . . and, yes, he does . . . the Chicago Bulls select Memphis point guard Derrick Rose with the No. 1 selection, officing kicking off tonight's NBA Draft.

And, it's also official: I just consumed my first junk food of the evening . . . a mini-pepperoni pizza, via Costco. Only 3 1/2 minutes in the microwave. It did the trick, for the time being.

Back to Rose: He was the obvious choice. I'm not sure he'll be as good as Chris Paul, Deron Williams or Tony Parker. But he'll be close enough to make the Bulls a much better team.

Despite what is being reported by some media outlets this afternoon, the Clippers and Seattle have not agreed to swap their respective (4 for Seattle and 7 for the Clippers) slots in the first round of tonight's NBA Draft in New York City.

According to a source, the proposed deal fell through before it was ever agreed upon.

I've seen more competitive contests in girls CIF basketball playoff first-round games.

I can't recall an NBA championship game that was such a blatant mismatch.

Any unbiased observer who watched the first five game of the Lakers-Boston series would have opined that the Celtics were the superior team.

Now, after the tail-whipping the Lakers got in Boston tonight, even the most hard-core of Lakers' honks will have to readily concede that the NBA's best team won the championship.

Every Eastern Conference opponent (Atlanta, Cleveland and Detroit) were much more competitive against the Celtics than were the Lakers.

And, once and for all, can we cool all of this "Kobe Bryant is as good as, or better than, Michael Jordan was"?

That myth got trounced in the series as well.

In my Tuesday Press-Telegram column, I referred to Los Alamitos High basketball guard "Josh Cheek" when the player's first name is actually Jacob.

His brother was Josh and played for the Griffins a few seasons ago.

Jacob is a very good jump shooter and played well at the Mater Dei Tournament this past weekend.

If any of you kids are still looking for something to give dad, invest $5 in the admission to the Mater Dei Basketball Tournament today.

Games are underway even as you're reading this, when the championship semifinals set for 1:30 p.m. (Mater Dei vs. Dominguez) and 3 (Concord De La Salle vs. Poly).

The third-place game is at 6 and the title game at 7:30.

There is no rationalizing this loss, no crying about the officiating or passing the buck anywhere else for the Lakers:

If you're leading by 20 points with six minutes and change to go in the third quarter, at home, and you think you're a team capable of winning the NBA title, you win the game.

So this is how it stands for Kobe's Crew: After suffering one of the biggest collapses in NBA finals history, they will need an even bigger collape by Boston over the next three games to win a championship.

That's all.

OK, more details on the Mater Dei High boys basketball tournament, which gets underway at the Santa Ana school at 3 o'clock on Friday afternoon and wraps up with a 7:30 championship game Sunday evening:

Some of the opening-round matchups include Dominguez vs. Capistrano Valley (3), Los Alamitos vs. JSerra (6) and Poly vs. St. John Bosco (7:30).

Projected semfinals on Sunday: Dominguez vs. Mater Dei (1:30) and JSerra vs. Concord De La Salle (3).

The Air Strike Football Passing Tournament gets underway at 9 a.m. at Dana Hills Saturday, with the championship game of the eight-team event set for 2 p.m.

Opening matchups on the four fields at 9: Mater Dei vs. Dana Hills, Poly vs. Inglewood, Los Alamitos vs. Tesoro and Edison vs. San Clemente.

The Los Alamitos (John Barnes) vs. Tesoro (Brian Barnes) game features head coaches who are father (John) and son (Brian).

If Mater Dei and Poly win their opening games, they'll play at 10 a.m. on Field 1. They're the likely preseason top-two teams in the CIF Southern Section's Pac-5 Division.