As the Golden State Warriors embark on a quest for a third consecutive NBA title, they do so with a new perspective provided by an unlikely source. “When we had the preseason game in Vegas, I saw Kobe,” Draymond Green told ESPN earlier this season. “I’m like, ‘How is retirement?’ He said, ‘Draymond, it is f—ing incredible.’ He said, ‘It’s the best thing.””
Storyline: Kobe Bryant Retirement
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“He left feeling like, ‘I gave y’all every f—ing thing I had and that’s it,'” Green continued “So no, [Kobe is] not sitting in retirement like, ‘Man, I wish I can go be out there.’ No, he’s on to the next thing because [he] gave that one thing everything [he] had. And I think it will be very similar with this team. Whenever that point comes, we’re going to know that we gave it everything we got and you move on. But you feel good about moving on. You’re not sick about moving on.”
Definitively shutting down any and all rumors of him returning to play basketball, Kobe Bryant sat down for an interview on the Rich Eisen Show to reveal that he will “never come back to the game.” He didn’t mince his words during the interview, making sure everyone gets the idea. “I’m here to show people we (athletes) can do much more than that,” he said.
Explaining why he doesn’t plan on ever returning to basketball, he said, “When I retired, everybody was saying, ‘He’s too competitive. He’s not going to know what to do with himself. He’s going to have to come back.’ I took that as a personal challenge of them thinking I’m this one-dimensional person. That all I know is to dribble the ball, shoot the ball, play basketball and compete at that level.”
Tania Ganguli: Kobe says former players were checking in on him as he retired to see if he’d be ok. One gave advice on how to cope with the post-playing career depression. “I’m like what the f—?” he said. “I’m good. … The most important thing is finding what you love to do.”
Kobe Bryant will add another distinction to his Hall of Fame career on Monday, when the Los Angeles Lakers — a franchise with no shortage of all-time greats in its history — will recognize both eras of his incredible 20-year run by retiring Nos. 8 and 24. Just like that, one man will own two of the Lakers’ 11 retired jerseys. “He’s turned himself into a folktale. And it’s a great folktale,” Kyrie Irving told Yahoo Sports. “He’s like the abominable snowman that you can actually see in person. Almost like people are unsure if he’s approachable or not, but he’s an open book when you go and talk to him. It’s awesome to know that one of the greats to ever do it is taking the time to really give you knowledge that is about furthering your career and achieve greatness that you’ve dreamt of as a kid. He does it strictly for progressing the culture.”
Pau Gasol: You deserve this one and all the recognitions in the world. Thank you for bringing so much to the sport of basketball #brother! Te mereces este y todos los reconocimientos del mundo. Gracias por todo lo que has aportado a este deporte #hermano! #Ko8e24
Jayson Tatum: Both.
Kobe Bryant: Different animal, same beast.
Allen Iverson: Congrats!!! #Str8SerialKilla @Kobe Bryant
Ryan Ward: Luke Walton on if #Lakers players will watch Kobe’s jersey retirement ceremony like the Warriors at halftime: “Our first priority is the job we have… I’m sure there will be some halftime adjustments.”
Bryant, who gave an informal backstage pep talk to the fighters, can’t stick around for the card. He said he was in a rush to get home to his three daughters, the oldest of which, Gianna, has flashed some of the same basketball skills as her dad. Bryant has said he has no interest in a Lakers’ front office role and is content to keep his scouting reports within the family. “I coach my daughter’s sixth grade team. That’s the extent of it all,” Bryant said. “She’s a beast. She’s tough. She’s a little firecracker, man.”
Ramona Shelburne: The Lakers are planning to retire Kobe’s jersey before the Warriors game on Dec 18, per team sources. No word yet on whether it’ll be No. 8 or 24.
Bryant says he hasn’t had any pangs of withdrawal since his playing days ended, mostly because he’s so busy with his studio company. “I don’t miss it – not even a little,” Bryant says. “It’s crazy, right? I love what I’m doing right now. I’m all in on my studio projects.”
Bryant is too fresh off his playing career and deep into his business pursuits. But it’s worth noting that he met with Buss and Rambis in February to give his opinion on the state of the franchise. He also advocated for Pelinka, his former agent, who will take over as the Lakers general manager. That left Johnson, who was probably Buss’ first choice, anyway. He reached out to check on her after the announcement that her engagement to Jackson was off. They planned to have dinner, and the rest happened quickly. When you’ve been operating without trust for so long, it makes the desire for it even stronger — and there are few people in the world whom Buss trusts more than Johnson.
I got to ask, because I feel like the setting’s begging for it: What’s your relationship with death? Kobe Bryant: A comfortable one. Yeah? Kobe Bryant: It’s a comfortable one. It’s an understanding. You can’t have life without death. Can’t have light without the dark. So it’s an acceptance of that. When it came time to decide whether or not I should retire, [it was] really an acceptance of that mortality that all athletes face. And if you combat it, you’ll always have that inner struggle within yourself. … So … I’m comfortable with it.
In The Wall Street Journal, you said that you’d been planning this phase as early as three years back. What was the moment that made you decide to start planning? Kobe Bryant: Well, the injury. When I injured my Achilles, then it became something where it’s, OK, this is immediate, right? The end of my career could be now. So since I was 21 years old and thinking, OK, I have to figure out what comes next. You kind of brainstorm, you ideate, but you never really execute anything. And when the injury happened, I said, “OK, no, I need to start building now.” And that’s when the turning point was for me.
Kobe Bryant doesn't miss playing
Kobe Bryant admitted to watching a few games during the first week of the NBA season. But playing again? Not a chance. “Not even a little bit,” Bryant said Tuesday morning at the launch of his latest signature Nike shoe, the “Kobe A.D.” “It’s strange to think a couple years ago, to be in this emotional space would be unfathomable. But I mean not even a smidge, which I’m very thankful for, because it’s made my transition seamless and I can really just watch and just enjoy the games.”
Asked how closely he’s followed the NBA — in particular the incredible individual performances by Anthony Davis, Russell Westbrook and Kawhi Leonard — in the first week of the new season, Bryant said, “I’ve been following it. I wouldn’t say closely, but if I’m home and I have a chance to put the game on, and I’m home, I’ll put the game on. I kind of know generally who is winning and who is losing. Players have been playing phenomenally well, which is rare. Normally at the start of the season you kind of have to work yourself into a rhythm. This year they just came out of the gates smoking. That’s rare.”
Kobe Bryant and Tim Duncan have already retired after this past season, and Kevin Garnett still hasn’t decided whether to return for another year. “It may go down as the greatest retirement summer in NBA history,” Rivers said, hailing the competitiveness of that group. “The biggest thing, I think, those guys knew how to play. Kevin’s knowledge of the game — and Kevin doesn’t want to hear it, I literally talked to Kevin last night — but Kevin could be the greatest big man teacher in the game right now if he wanted to be. Whenever he did do it in practice there’s no one better than that. Paul Pierce is an NBA encyclopedia. You can ask Paul Pierce any historical question about the NBA. He knows it, he studies it, he loves it. Duncan’s the same way. What’s neat about all three of them (is) they’re all completely different individuals. I’ve never seen three different people, and Kobe can be four different individuals, yet all great in their own right.”
Mike Trudell: Luke Walton on coming in with no Kobe: “20 years, one of the greatest runs in any sport by any athlete. He’s obviously going to be missed.” Luke Walton said Kobe’s exit does open the door for the next stage and movement of Lakers basketball.
Roland Lazenby recently joined the Triple Threat Podcast to discuss his upcoming book about Bryant. While bound to an understandable secrecy agreement with his publishing house (Little Brown), Roland Lazenby was able to describe the project as a 600-page journey through Kobe Bryant’s life and the path his basketball career took. Outside of his most recent book (Michael Jordan: The Life), Lazenby has also written a biography on former Laker Jerry West and taken in-depth looks at the life and career of both Phil Jackson (while he was coaching the Bulls) and even a young Bryant. Roland Lazenby also acknowledged that the book does spend some time focusing on the life of Bryant’s father Joe “Jellybean” Bryant as an NBA player and the parallels Lazenby described as “a pretty compelling story about Kobe being the force of nature” that he has been, and how their two stories are interlinked in the obvious father/son ways and beyond.
While Roland Lazenby described Bryant’s final year as sub par when compared to the incredible standard he established throughout his Hall of Fame career, he said a portion of the book will also center around the vintage 60-point scoring performance Bryant left us with and how unique of a farewell game that truly was. He also described the project as a view of Bryant as both a cultural and sports figure and said his basic focus was on the 20-year career and all the relationships that played a role in developing and maintaining Bryant’s greatness along the way.
FTW: How has retirement been for you? Kobe Bryant: Retirement’s been great for me. I’m focused on the next thing and enjoying that. I get up every morning, and I’m excited to get to it. It’s been good. FTW: John Black said the morning after the game, that you had woken up really early, gone to the gym, got in the office by 8:30, is that still something you’ve kept up? KB: 8! (laughs) Yeah, yeah. I love everything I’m doing. I’m very, very fortunate to be able to say that. It’s always been a great fear of playing the game is will you be able to love the next thing as much as you love playing. Fortunately for me, the answer is yes.
His next move? Ghostbuster. The Black Mamba let The Players’ Tribune ride along for his Ghostbusters commercial shoot.
FTW: There was an AP story that came out and said you’ve been speaking with Spielberg and a lot of the giants in the movie industry, but have you called people from other facets of the business world, as well? KB: Yeah, I’ve been really fortunate to have really great mentors throughout my career, which have nothing to do with basketball. Anna Wintour, Arianna Huffington, Mark Parker, Jony Ive, to be able to have access to them, to speak to them — just speak, not necessarily about business in particular, just nature and people and culture and things like that.
FTW: What’s your stance on eSports and has that changed? Recently, ESPN has been getting into it, it’s now seen more of as a legitimate sport whereas before it was viewed as just video games and not a real sport. KB: I think people are really interested in watching people problem solve. It doesn’t matter what industry. People are very fascinated by that — seeing the struggles people go through and how they overcome it. I think this was just a matter of time before it caught fire. To be able to sit and watch a performance on TV and watch how the gamers are figuring out those challenges amongst themselves, you can’t help but be interested.
A piece of the Staples Center game floor specially made for Kobe Bryant’s last game sold for $179,100. The piece, four panels measuring four feet by eight feet each, had Kobe’s former number 8 on it and was signed by Bryant after he scored 60 points in his final game on April 13.
Byron Scott spent his last two years in Los Angeles, in his words, doing a juggling act. “You do have a bunch of guys that you are trying to develop and get them to understand how to play the right way,” he said on The Dan Patrick Show on Monday morning. “And then you have Kobe basically on a (farewell) tour.”
According to il Corriere dello Sport, Kobe Bryant is interested in investing in Italian team Pallacanestro Reggiana.
Silver said he and the league have already been in discussions with Bryant about incorporating him into the NBA’s future plans in myriad ways, similar to the role that Celtics legend Bill Russell has with the NBA. “I’m sure this is not the last chapter for him, in terms of the NBA,” Silver told the group at NBA headquarters. “He’s talked a lot about all kinds of things, but he said he’d be particularly interested in doing something around media. “There’s some film projects he’s talked to us about. I think he really wants to explore how it is he can teach the game to others, how he can present the inside of the game.”
Chris Bosh on Kobe Bryant: We went to the village to hang out a few times while the Olympic Games were going on, and I remember everybody walking through the arcade that they’d set up for the athletes. There were a bunch of games, but in particular, they had those mini pop-a-shot basketball games that you can find in just about every arcade in the world. Kobe and Michael Redd started playing, and things got competitive. After a few games, I got tired of watching, so I left to meet up with some friends. I had to have been gone for a couple of hours. When it was almost time to head back to the hotel, I stopped by the arcade again and those guys were still playing! Both of them were in a full sweat with a focus like it was a real game. That was pretty funny to me because I’d always heard about how competitive Kobe was and in that moment, I got to witness it for myself.
Sixty points?! On 50 shots?! “It was like I was forced to,” Kobe says. “By the crowd and mostly by teammates.” What was more ridiculous? That his 60 points was twice as many as any Hall of Famer has scored in his last regular-season game. That, at age 37, he was five years older than anyone else who has scored 60 points? That no one has taken 50 shots in an NBA game in 49 years? Or that his teammates didn’t want him to pass? “I challenged him to score 50 points and that motherfucker got 60,” O’Neal said as he stood on the court long after Kobe had left it, trying to process his final brazen act. “It would have taken me four months to get 50 shots on any of the teams I played for,” Horace Grant said. “And that motherfucker took 50 in one night.”
His back hurts and his shoulder is sore from 20 years in the league and 50 god damn shots! And he’s laughing at me, at anyone, who thought he’d be at peace going out any other way. “What you saw there was the opening scene of the basketball version of the blood-spattered bride,” Bryant says. “The opening scene of ‘Kill Bill.'”
There’s the obvious swipe at the narcissism that’s made him at least as famous as his scoring. Of course Kobe has moved into a world of his own making. The only surprise is that he’d pass the vision to a group of writers and trust that they’d execute it better than he could. “I think Walt did this with animation, as well,” he says. Yes, he’s referring to Walt Disney. “He quickly realized that, although he could draw pretty well, there are other animators out there that are just much, much better. He went and found those animators and gave them the vision and allowed them to do what they do best. If you collaborate with great people and each one is enhancing the other, that’s when we create things that are timeless.”
Bryant seemed surprised when he and I boarded an elevator together a couple of hours before the Lakers played the Grizzlies. He recovered quickly and started asking about my daily routine — how often I filed stories, tweeted to followers, etc. He was already gathering information for his post-basketball career, which he hoped would include a website launch akin to Derek Jeter’s theplayerstribune.com, of which Bryant was an original investor. Along those lines, imagine my surprise last season when Bryant didn’t glare at a reporter who asked whether his career was headed the way of Michael Jordan’s — slow in the beginning, plenty of championships in the middle and rough at the end for team and player.
Bryant weighed the question, then said it was fair because it was “reachable content.” He almost sounded like an editor. Last November, I figured he probably wouldn’t find a lengthy Times story I co-wrote with Broderick Turner to be under the same “reachable” category.
Kenny Smith’s dream may actually come true … ’cause “Inside the NBA” has reached out to Kobe Bryant to see if he wants a job, TMZ Sports has learned. Both Kenny and Shaq have publicly talked about wanting Kobe to join the panel on the TNT show after he retired from the NBA … and now, our sources tell us the courting has officially begun.
Bill Oram: LAL GM Mitch Kupchak: “I’d put that night up against any Game 7, any championship, in terms of a performance in the last game of the season”
Mark Medina: Mitch on Kobe’s last game: ” I don’t know how he got through that game.”
Tom Orsborn: Manu on Kobe: “The way he closed it out was unbelievable, the 3s, the contested shots & getting the win. It was a great goodbye party.”
Kobe Bryant not only set a points record for a player of his age in his final NBA game Wednesday night — he also helped the Staples Center and the Los Angeles Lakers break industry merchandise records. On Wednesday alone, the Staples Center sold $1.2 million worth of Kobe merchandise, Sean Ryan, AEG vice president of merchandise told ESPN. Ryan said that’s a single-day sales record for any arena in the world.
Prices of the merchandise were certainly for the well-heeled. Most of the hats, more than 60 percent of which sold out, cost $72.48 each. There were eight hats made out of snake and lamb skin that cost $38,024 and eight hats made from cashmere with five diamonds on it that cost $24,008. Ryan said only three went unsold.
Kobe Bryant not only set a points record for a player of his age in his final game Wednesday night, he also helped the Staples Center and the Los Angeles Lakers break all-time industry merchandise records. On Wednesday alone, the Staples Center sold $1.2 million worth of Kobe merchandise, Sean Ryan, AEG vice president of merchandise told ESPN. Ryan said that’s a single-day sales record for any arena in the world.
The Los Angeles Rams knew they would command huge swathes of public opinion when they announced their blockbuster trade with the Tennessee Titans for the number one pick in the draft. And indeed they did, but it happened about 12 hours after they knew the deal was in place. Knowing that Kobe was preparing to take the court for the final time of his career, the two teams didn’t want to overshadow his moment and therefore delayed the announcement until the following morning, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter.
Damian Lillard: This is literally the moment I was told “Kobe has 60 with 10 seconds left” Amazing @Kobe Bryant!
Dwyane Wade: What else should we have expected. It’s only Kobe Bryant were talking about. 60!!!!!! You never seem to amaze. #Salute @kobebryant
January 21, 2020 | 8:11 am UTC Update
There’s a reason they arrived at this figure. Speaking of which, here are the exact figures: The Athletic has learned the final year of this deal is only $2.5M guaranteed, out of $9.5M total. The payouts by year are $8.5M in 2020-21, $8.8M in 2021-22, $9.2M in 2022-23, and the partially guaranteed final year of $9.5M in 2023-24).
Celtics swingman Jaylen Brown thought Boston wouldn’t budge from its original $80 million extension offer before the front office substantially sweetened the pot, he told ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski on the Woj Pod (hat tip to Nick Goss of NBC Sports Boston). Brown eventually signed a four-year, $115 million rookie-scale extension, which included $12 million in incentives. “To be honest, I came with the mindset I didn’t think that anything was going to get done,” Brown told Wojnarowski. “I wasn’t sure that anything was going to get done. The first offer was four years, $80 million. I didn’t think they were going to budge from that. So, I came with the mindset, I told (agent Jason) Glushon that, ‘Let’s see what can happen, you know?’ For me, I didn’t think Jason was going to be able to get anything done. I thought they were going to stay at ($80 million) and that was going to be it.”
Without an extension, Brown would have entered restricted free agency this summer. He was fully prepared to do that until the offer grew. “I was hell-bent, I was already locked in, focused, ready to carry the weight that I was going to go into this year playing my fourth year out. And then they jumped up, and that just showed they wanted me here in the organization,” he said on the podcast. “They appreciated my value. They thought that I added to winning. It was an offer that was too hard to kind of turn down.”
ESPN Stats: Damian Lillard is the 6th player in NBA history with multiple 60-point games. They are the only two 60-point games in @trailblazers history. His 61 points are a new franchise record.
“I’m just trying to have fun. I’m just trying to smile more. Be in the moment more,” Antetokounmpo said recently. “If I’ve got to dance to relax, I’ll dance to relax. If I’ve got to fall on the floor and do some pushups, I’ll fall on the floor and do some pushups. I’m just trying to have fun, smile. At the end of the day, it’s basketball and we’re winning. Why would we not have fun?”
Antetokounmpo, the overwhelming favorite to win MVP again, believes that line of thinking should be turned the other way, toward the team that is currently on pace to become the third team in NBA history to win 70 games. “I don’t think there’s a team in this league we cannot beat,” Antetokounmpo said.
“It’s tough when you got a lot of guys that can go, that can do a lot of things with the basketball,” Celtics guard Marcus Smart says. “It makes it tough to get into a rhythm. Last year was different for all of us.”
“I kind of got pushed to the side, and that kind of messed with my confidence a little bit,” he says. “Not only did I start not believing in myself that much, but I started overthinking, and that’s when anxiety and stuff came in. It took me a while to get out of that.”
“I think you just don’t know what it’s going to be like to coach stars of that ilk,” Vogel said. “They’ve been wonderful, from the time I took the job, they’ve been very collaborative. Come together with a plan, they’ve helped with the buy in with the rest of the group. It hasn’t been the type of challenge that you may expect coaching stars of that caliber.”
In his second interview since getting axed in December, David Fizdale was on “The Jump” and repeated he had no “regret’ but added: “For me personally, the toughest part was that I didn’t fulfill what I went there to do. I wanted to give the fans a relative team, a winner. The fan base was so awesome and so passionate about the team. The fact that I couldn’t get over the hump to where I wanted to get it to; that part is a tough pill to swallow.”
Any team that holds a formal “shootaround” or, for that matter, a practice, has to invite the media. Players are also supposed to be available in the locker room for 30 minutes prior to each game, but there is a basic working agreement between the league and press that players should either be available at shootaround or before the game, but not both. What has happened, though, is that most of the league’s stars, LeBron included, do not talk in that 30-minute span, ever, even if there is no shootaround.
Teams, like the Lakers, are still holding meetings and walk-throughs and working out injured players the mornings of games, they just aren’t inviting the media. They get away with it by not calling whatever it is that they’re doing a “shootaround.” Not every team is doing this — the Celtics, for instance, had a lengthy shootaround and media session afterward Monday morning — but the Lakers appear to be one. Over and over, the team announces it is not holding a shootaround (or even a practice on an off day), and then their players contradict them by referencing the workouts after the fact. On Monday, Quinn Cook posted a picture to social media of Danny Green at TD Garden for a morning workout.
An agitated Delonte West was captured discussing an alleged altercation. The person who posted the clip of the former NBA player to social media, Twitter user @damani_givens, told Complex that the video was taken in Washington D.C. West appears to be saying that someone approached him with a gun as he was walking down the street. However, when he was asked further detail about his account of the incident, Delonte repeatedly said “I don’t give a fuck” twice before ranting about something that’s difficult to understand.
In another video circulating social media, someone who appears to be West is getting kicked and punched in the middle of a busy road. The man on the ground, presumably Delonte, is laying motionless as someone else roughs him up.
January 21, 2020 | 1:58 am UTC Update
Salman Ali: James Harden on why he decided to get extra shots up post-game: “Just getting back to the basics. When you’re struggling, you try to get back to the fundamentals and the basics of your shot-form. Form-shooting and things like that.”
Alykhan Bijani: James Harden: “We’re playing well, playing well and then (we) stop doing the things that were getting us the lead. Sooner or later, we’re going to put a four-quarter game together and just build off that.” #Rockets
Eric Woodyard: Giannis Antetokounmpo reflects on scoring 10K career points vs Bulls: “Being in this position, I could never imagine myself coming in the NBA, now I have 10,000 career points and I can get to 20,000 … I can get to 30,000. It’s up to me, but I’m extremely blessed.”
Jim Eichenhofer: Jrue Holiday, asked about what #Pelicans want Zion Williamson to bring: “What he does. We’re not here to think he (needs) to save us. We want his energy, rebounding, explosiveness. He’s a threat offensively obviously. I don’t see anyone who’s able to compete with him at the rim.”
Will Guillory: BI on Jrue’s defense vs Ja Morant today: “He goes out there and he takes so much pride in sliding his feet and locking down the key player on the (opposing) team. It’s special for a guy that good on the offensive end to come down and have the same energy on the defensive end.”
Anthony Slater: Draymond Green is now questionable. In Portland but not feeling great. Won’t start and Steve Kerr said probably won’t play. Will suit up because they have 8 guys, but won’t play unless needed.
Connor Letourneau: Glenn Robinson III (ankle) remains out.
Logan Murdock: Steve Kerr said he was hopeful Kevon Looney could’ve been in the lineup by now, but said he’s still having complications. Kerr declined to specify if his absence was related to his neuropathy: “It’s something I’d rather not expand on b/c I don’t have a good grasp on it.”
January 21, 2020 | 1:30 am UTC Update
Eric Walden: Quin Snyder, on Royce O’Neale’s contract extension; “Well-deserved, and earned. … He’s just worked from the time he’s got here. … The best thing that you can say about Royce is he helps your team win games. It’s rare to have a guy that’s that selfless.”
Jonathan Feigen: Russell Westbrook: “Honestly, I thought we played a good game. Obviously, the last six minutes we didn’t play our best basketball.” OK. I guess the Rockets won, three sets to one.
Rick Noland: “We were not good,” Beilein said. “We could not make a shot. We missed 60 shots.” Actually, 62 in 94 attempts
KC Johnson: Asked if he’d like to get ball on move more, Markkanen said: “Yeah, I think I can do a lot of good things besides just shoot threes. Haven’t really been able to do that lately. Just have to figure out the way I can attack the rim more and get to the free throw line.”
Chris Iseman: Marcus Morris will have his ankle re-evaluated tomorrow. He’s hoping to be able to play on Wednesday against the Lakers.
January 21, 2020 | 12:55 am UTC Update
Tim MacMahon: Thunder 112, Rockets 107 (final). Houston blows a 17-point lead in the final 15:20 of the Rockets’ fourth straight loss and fifth in six games. OKC scored 41 points in the fourth quarter.
Tim MacMahon: Mike D’Antoni: “Right now, we’re in a period where if something goes bad, it goes bad. When it rains, it pours, and it’s pouring.”
Barry Jackson: Heat overcomes 8-point fourth quarter deficit, beats Kings 118-113 in overtime. Nunn 25, Johnson 22 and block of late 3-pointer. Heat 30-13 overall and 7-0 in OT.
Scott Kushner: FINAL: Pelicans 126, Grizzlies 116. New Orleans snaps Memphis’ seven-game winning streak under an assault of 3 pointers. Pels have won 11 of 16 since losing 13 straight. They are 3 games out of the No. 8 spot in the West with Zion Williamson returning on Wednesday.
Eric Walden: Nate McMillan, on Bojan Bogdanovic: “We know he doesn’t need a lot of space. He’s hot right now. He’s playing his best basketball this season.”
January 21, 2020 | 12:29 am UTC Update
KC Johnson: Bucks 111, Bulls 98 Bulls are 1-18 vs. winning teams. Markkanen failed to score in 2nd half, shot 2-for-11 overall. Both makes were tip-ins.
Kane Pitman: Giannis Antetokounmpo completes the triple-double on a dish to DiVincenzo in mid air on a Dirk fade in the post. He finishes with 28 points, 14 rebounds and 10 assists as he checks out of the game. Just another night at the office for the MVP.
Rod Boone: Final: Magic 106, #Hornets 83 Malik Monk 20 pts/2 assists PJ Washington 19 pts/7 rebs Devonte’ Graham 15 pts (5 of 17)/6 assists Evan Fournier 26 pts That’s now 7 straight losses. Up next: vs. Milwaukee in Paris on Friday
Mike Vorkunov: Knicks 106, Cavs 86. Knicks now 12-32 — tied w/ Cavs for 3rd-worst record Knicks are 8-14 under interim HC Mike Miller. Marcus Morris & Julius Randle with 19 points each. Elfrid Payton with 9p/8a/6r. Damyean Dotson with 12p/5r & Bobby Portis with 12p/5r/4a
Gerald Bourguet: Kelly Oubre is available tonight. Aron Baynes (hip soreness) and Cam Johnson (thigh) are both out
January 21, 2020 | 12:24 am UTC Update
Michael Singer: Malone asked about his potential role with Serbian national team: “Right now I’m having some dialogue with Igor. We’ve had some great conversations. Nothing is official yet, but it’s something that I definitely have interest in.”
JD Shaw: Veteran center Willie Reed has signed an NBA G League contract and will be acquired by the Salt Lake City Stars as a returning player. Reed, 29, parted ways with Olympiacos earlier in the month.
Eric Woodyard: Giannis Antetokounmpo reaches 10,000 points for his career, becoming the 7th player in Bucks history with 10K points. He also joins Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as the only Bucks players with 10K pts and 4K rebounds in franchise history. He has 24 points vs. Chicago.
