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The best way to start your day is with this newsletter and Sam Amick telling you what he’s hearing on ye olde trade front.
Anybody Can Get It
It didn’t count, but Ja still baptized Wemby
If I may paraphrase and slightly alter the words of the late, great Biggie Smalls, “I live for the dunk; I’ll die for the dunk.” I’m doing so because life sometimes gives us a dunk so great, we don’t even care whether it counts. That’s what happened last night during the Grizzlies’ 129-115 victory over the Spurs.
With a little over two minutes left in the game, Ja Morant drove down the left side of the floor. He was fouled around the 3-point line by Stephon Castle but kept driving because he didn’t hear the whistle. All Morant saw was Victor Wembanyama under the basket, and he wanted to dunk on him again. Remember when he did it during his brief, nine-game stint last season? Well, he kept going … and Wemby challenged him. It resulted in this dead-ball poster.
Ja Morant just threw down a CRAZY dunk after the whistle 🤯😱 pic.twitter.com/fpQnist4AJ
— NBA (@NBA) January 16, 2025
Ay dios mio! That’s a lot of dunk! And when something this vicious happens at the rim, it should count no matter what. Wemby had 13 points, 12 rebounds and eight blocks in the game, but those stats didn’t matter. We thought it was a big moment when Zach Edey dunked on him early in the game. Morant’s finish was so fun that nobody cared that it didn’t count. But it counted to us.
More on last night’s action:
Knicks 125 (27-15), 76ers 119 (15-24), OT: There was no Karl-Anthony Towns or Joel Embiid, but this was still fun. The Sixers came roaring back in the second half to force overtime, but Jalen Brunson (38 points) and Josh Hart (10 points, 12 assists, 17 rebounds and four steals) were too much for Philly. And KAT apparently changed outfits at halftime because of sweat stains?
Raptors 110 (10-31), Celtics 97 (28-12): WUT?? Boston was fully healthy and scored just 15 points in the fourth quarter against Toronto. Maybe it’s actually time to worry about the Celtics?
Hawks 110 (21-19), Bulls 94 (18-23): Atlanta was without Trae Young, Jalen Johnson and Dominique Wilkins, but Keaton Wallace (27 points, six rebounds, six assists, four steals) led the Hawks over a Bulls team that shot 6 of 27 from deep and turned it over 20 times.
Bucks 122 (22-17), Magic 93 (23-19): Milwaukee shot 62.5 percent from the field and put this one away by halftime. Giannis Antetokounmpo finished 26 points and 11 rebounds while Damian Lillard dropped an easy 30. The Bucks moved past Orlando for fourth in the East.
Hornets 117 (9-28), Jazz 112 (10-29): Utah had no answer for Mark Williams (31 points, 13 rebounds), and LaMelo Ball helped lead a big fourth quarter to bury the Jazz.
Clippers 126 (22-17), Nets 67 (14-27): Kawhi Leonard had 23 points on 8-of-11 shooting in 24 minutes as the Clippers led by as many as 64 points in this one. In an effort to avoid embarrassment, the Nets did cut their deficit to 59 by the final buzzer, but this is still the worst loss in franchise history.
The Last 24
Postponements make the NBA readjust
📅 Schedule reshuffle. The NBA had to reschedule nine games in order to make up for lost nights. Take a look at what changed.
🤝 Suns trade. Phoenix acquired 27-year-old center Nick Richards from the Hornets. These are the details.
💸 Jersey for sale. A kid received a jersey from Wemby after a game, and it’s already up for auction. Here is Wemby’s reaction.
🏀 Player of the year? Cooper Flagg (18 years old until Dec. 21) might run away with this season’s College Player of the Year award. Who can catch him?
📺 Don’t miss this game tonight. Cavaliers (34-5) at Thunder (33-6), 7:30 p.m. ET on TNT. This is a rematch of the best game of the season.
Assess the West
None of you believe OKC has a viable threat
We polled the Bouncers (you 🫵) in yesterday’s edition to see if you believed in any West team to beat the Thunder. OKC has been the best team in the conference all season but doesn’t have an obvious challenger right now. So, we went through each of the other 11 teams vying for some postseason glory (or at least an appearance for some revenue), and it turns out you don’t believe in any of them. Let’s go squad by squad:
- Rockets (27-12): 93.7 percent of you said they wouldn’t beat the Thunder in a series. The reasons: 43.7 percent picked lack of experience, 23.7 percent said it’s Houston’s bad offense and 15.3 percent said it’s because of Dillon Brooks. One of you blamed the ghost of James Harden.
- Grizzlies (26-15): 91.2 percent of you said they wouldn’t take down OKC. The reasons: 44.2 percent picked unreliable offense/shooting, and 24 percent said key injuries would hold them back. One person said it will be because of the ghost of Steven Adams.
- Nuggets (24-16): 58.9 percent of you said they beat the Thunder. The reasons: 33.3 percent picked lack of depth as the reason, and 27.5 percent said there is no help around Nikola Jokić. One of you implied Russell Westbrook is a spy for the Thunder.
- Clippers (22-17): 99 percent of you said it’s not happening for the Clippers – 99 percent! The reasons: 42 percent of you said it’s because of Kawhi Leonard’s health. Many of you wrote in “everything” is keeping them from pulling it off. One person simply said, “Duh – it’s the Clippers.” Ouch.
- Mavericks (22-19): 79.5 percent of you said the Mavs won’t beat the Thunder again. The reasons: 43.7 percent questioned Luka Dončić’s health, and 26.2 percent don’t believe in Dallas’ defense. Someone said Dallas overachieved last year, and another believes in OKC getting revenge for last year.
We also asked about teams not in the current top six in the West. We’re talking about the likes of the Wolves, Kings, Spurs, Warriors and Suns. Of those teams, who has the best chance of beating OKC?
- Minnesota led the vote here with a 38.7 percent chance to beat OKC.
- The Suns were next with 12.8 percent before being followed by the Warriors (12.3), Kings (10.7), Lakers (9) and Spurs (7.1).
- A lot of you wrote in some version of “nobody,” and I don’t think you were quoting Keith Sweat.
- Someone suggested Phoenix could pull it off by trading for Jimmy Butler and jell better than expected, which is reasonable.
Also, every time we run a poll here and leave a write-in option for blank/other, one of you always seems to write in “Thanasis Antetokounmpo” as an answer. It doesn’t matter the subject. It doesn’t matter the context. And you did it again. I will find you. One day, I will find you. You are my sworn enemy. Thank you to literally everybody else who voted. Not you, though, Thanasis scribe.
More from these West teams last night:
Rockets 128 (27-12), Nuggets 108 (24-16): Speaking of the Rockets: they smacked the Nuggets around last night. Jokić didn’t play, and Jalen Green led Houston with 34 points. Alperen Şengün had 20-9-8 as the Rockets had their fourth-best shooting game of the season.
Warriors 116 (20-20), Wolves 115 (21-19): The Wolves were down 24 points in the first quarter and never led in this game. But they did fight back to tie it a couple of times in the final frame. That was before Steph Curry kept happening as he closed out Minnesota with 31 points, eight assists and 7-of-12 shooting from deep.
Lakers 117 (21-17), Heat 108 (20-19): Miami was rolling in this one before the Lakers outscored it 63-42 in the second half. Rui Hachimura led LA with 23 points, Anthony Davis and LeBron James each had 22 and Austin Reaves chipped in 14 points and 14 dimes.
Pelicans 119 (10-32), Mavericks 116 (22-19): Dejounte Murray’s 30 points were enough to outlast a Mavs team without Dončić and Kyrie Irving. Zion Williamson was out with “return to competition reconditioning.” Seriously.
Future GOAT v. Established GOAT 🐐
LeBron was unguardable against MJ at 16
We never got to see LeBron James face off against Michael Jordan. By the time LeBron entered the league in the 2003-04 season, MJ had retired for a third and final (we think?) time. The 2002-03 season was the final campaign for MJ. That doesn’t mean they didn’t play basketball against each other, though. LeBron went on the Kelce brothers podcast this week to tell the story of when he was 16 years old and finally got on the court in the hallowed MJ pickup runs.
LeBron was on the court with Jordan, Anfernee Hardaway, Ron Artest, Antoine Walker, Michael Finley and others. When telling the story, he reminded people that they never let young guys play, but he was patient and eventually got on the court. So, who guarded LeBron?
“I was unguardable”
I would give anything to watch a 16 year old Lebron playing pickup with Michael Jordan pic.twitter.com/K4Xe4BdBwM
— New Heights (@newheightshow) January 15, 2025
“Nobody. I was unguardable.”
LeBron said he took full advantage of his opportunity to impress in that rare opportunity.
“When I finally got out there, I was busting a—, man. I was nervous, I was nervous as hell being out there with MJ and the rest of those guys. But I was like, ‘I’m about to go crazy.’ And I did.”
This is a fun story, and, even though we don’t have footage, it’s fun to imagine what happened on the court that day in Chicago. But also … how do I put this delicately … the internet has found plenty of moments in which LeBron has embellished the truth. It would be nice to have a second source on this. As Mark Puleo reminded us here, there is some good eyewitness testimony to corroborate this LeBron tale.
Ron Artest was recently on Paul George’s podcast and remembered this game.
“He was cooking. He was posting, getting to the basket, and I was like, ‘This is going to be a huge issue.’”
And nobody has footage of this? No video cameras? An artist rendering from a courtroom illustrator? Nothing?! 🤦
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(Top photo: Michael Gonzales / Getty Images )
