Clips claim Chauncey Billups off waivers

The Los Angeles Clippers did manage to acquire a point guard even after the collapse of their trade for Chris Paul by unexpect
The league's 30 teams were notified shortly after 6 p.m. ET on Monday that the Clippers had lodged the winning waiver bid for Billups, who was released Friday by the New York Knicks through the amnesty clause in the NBA's new labor agreement.

One source with knowledge of the deal told ESPN.com that the Clippers' winning bid to land Billups in the waiver auction was just over $2 million, meaning that the Knicks will still have to pay out the remaining balance of nearly $12 million from Billups' $14.2 million salary this season.

Had no team claimed him, Billups would have become an unrestricted free agent, sure to attract the interest of contenders such as the Miami Heat, Dallas Mavericks and the Los Angeles Lakers. ESPN.com reported earlier Monday that Dwight Howard also planned to lobby Billups to come to Orlando if he decided to stay with the Magic.

But the Clippers ignored the recent threats by Billups and agent Andy Miller that the 35-year-old would retire if he was claimed by a team he didn't want to join, giving their roster a veteran boost along with the recent signing of Caron Butler to a three-year deal worth $24 million.

"Chauncey is a warrior. He's a player. This is a similar situation -- we had this in the best year we had here -- with Sam Cassell. He got traded away from a place he was really comfortable in," Clippers general manager Neil Olshey said. "All we said was, 'Come in with an open mind. Give us a chance. Look at our culture, look at who we were.' The next year Sam becomes the Messiah, got us to the second round of the playoffs, signed a two-year deal for $14 million dollars and finished his career. It's not unlike that.

"There's going to be some work to do. I think Chauncey would've liked to control the process, but unfortunately we have to do what's best for our team. I think once he gets here and sees the resources we have, meets the guys and sees what kind of team we have, hopefully we can do the same thing with him as we were able to do with Sam and Marcus Camby."

Olshey, in a sitdown with local reporters shortly before the Billups news became public, explained that L.A. intended to use its remaining salary-cap space before matching the Golden State Warriors' four-year, $43 million offer sheet to restricted free agent DeAndre Jordan.

The Clippers then went out and did exactly what Olshey hinted at, claiming Billups and then matching the offer to Jordan. NBA rules dictate that the Clippers can't trade Billups this season after claiming him, so he can only play for L.A. if he plays in the NBA season unless he is released.

"There are some sequential transactions that have to happen first," Olshey said when asked whether the team would match Jordan's offer sheet. "We've still got $3.5 million in cap room and before we give up that flexibility we have to exhaust every opportunity that we have to use the remaining cap room we have.

"But I would expect DeAndre to be here smiling and being goofy and doing skits with Blake at some point at media day (Tuesday)."
The Charlotte Bobcats and New Jersey Nets were among the teams that flirted with making bids, along with the Clippers, despite Billups' threats of retirement if he was not allowed to pass through waivers and become an unrestricted free agent.

"If I get claimed by a team I don't want to play for, I would absolutely consider retirement," Billups said Saturday to ESPNNewYork.com's Ian O'Connor. "The game's been really good to me and I don't want anyone to feel bad for me. I've made a lot of money and I've saved most of it. I don't need the money now. I want to be able to play for something, a championship, and I want to be able to have my own destiny in my hands. If I don't, then retiring might have to be a decision I make."

The Knicks released Billups on Friday through the amnesty clause, needing to shed his $14.2 million expiring salary from the books to have sufficient salary-cap space to complete the sign-and-trade acquisition of Tyson Chandler. The reality is that a failure to join his new team, once claimed, would have jeopardized Billups' ability to collect the $14.2 million, which he remains entitled to from the Knicks even after they let him go.

"This is a different vehicle to acquire a player," Olshey said. "We're the first ones to do it (winning an amnesty auction) and I think there's a little uncertainty with everybody on how the process is going to work. All I know is this is another great addition to our roster. He's a perfect complement to how we play, he's a classy guy who's a veteran and a leader. He shoots the ball, he's won championships. He's going to be a great fit with our guys."

Miller said his client raised the possibility of retirement after news broke that the Knicks were close to an agreement with Chandler. Billups also didn't want to leave Denver last February when he was shipped to New York in the Carmelo Anthony trade.

"Chauncey's pissed off, but he's not pissed at the Knicks," Miller said. "He understands it's a business and they have to do what they have to do.

"But he's in a very frustrated state of mind because this has happened to him twice now. The way the league is structured, if you're a hot name and teams have interest in you, you have the ability to manufacture mass hysteria, and guys like Chauncey who put in years of high-level leadership, production, and service get lost."

Miller said numerous teams have expressed interest in Billups but that the five-time All-Star, as of the weekend, had not yet begun to sift through the options.

"It would be a complete waste of time right now," Miller said, "because it's been a very trying time for Chauncey.

"He enjoyed the city life in New York and had no gripes about his time there. But if he's picked up in a situation he doesn't want, maybe he retires, or he retires for one year, I don't know. If he can't choose his destiny and he's only there for 66 games, I think he'd much rather stay at home until the season is over."

Said Heat forward Chris Bosh about how much Miami wanted the 2004 NBA Finals MVP: "Yes, I would like to see Chauncey. Any player with his talent, leadership, his capability on the court. He's Mr. Big Shot. He has that name for a reason.

"I remember watching him with the Pistons back when they won it all. I think he fits here. With that said, we can't get too ahead of ourselves. We have to move on with what we have, and if that happens, that would be great. If it doesn't, we still expect to be a good team."
Marc Stein is a senior NBA writer for ESPN.com. ESPNLosAngeles.com's Ramona Shelburne and ESPN.com's Tom Haberstroh contributed to this report.
edly claiming Chauncey Billups off waivers.

LeBron, Heat's failure something Dirk, Mavericks know all too well

MIAMI -- One was arriving. The other was leaving. In each case, their clothes described the man.
Dirk Nowitzki had on a champagne-soaked white T-shirt and a championship cap he wore as if he were a 12-year-old in a fireman's hat. He walked down the hallway of the enemy arena with a bottle in his right hand and the Finals MVP trophy upside down in his left. He was the one who had arrived.
LeBron James was on his way, with no smell of liquor about him. He wore a blue suit and a gray tie and an unhappy expression of business. It was altogether a look that Nowitzki understood and was glad to have left behind.
"If I would have won one early in my career, maybe I would have never put all the work and the time in that I have over the last 13 years," said Nowitzki as he celebrated the championship that came with his Mavericks' 105-95 win in Game 6 of the Finals. "So this feels amazing."
What was the difference between the world's most talented player and the champion? There is nothing James cannot do on a basketball court. And yet there was nothing he could do to prevent Nowitzki's Mavericks from coming back to win Games 2 and 4 on their way to winning the final three games of the season.
The lesson for James is that there is no easy lesson to draw from Nowitzki's triumph. Five years ago he was in LeBron's shoes, wearing his glum expression, feeling the emptiness of his pain. The next year Nowitzki came back and won league MVP while earning the league's best record, and instead of winning a championship his top-seeded Mavs were upset in the first round by the Warriors. Over the four years after their '06 Finals collapse, the Mavs would win a single playoff series. Just last year they were upset in the opening round by the Spurs, who forced the ball out of Nowitzki's hands just as the Mavs were now able to do to James.
"It's a team that when you view it from afar, it doesn't look like a physically bruising type team," said coach Rick Carlisle of his Mavericks. "So a lot of people don't think we have the grit and the guts and the mental toughness. This is as mentally tough team I've been around."
In the year after Dallas surrendered a 2-0 lead to lose the next four Finals games to Dwyane Wade's Heat, Wade had heard enough of the Mavs' complaints about the officiating and the phantom calls he had exploited. Bluntly he said the Mavs had lost because Nowitzki hadn't been a strong leader.
Comments like that turned Nowitzki into a champion. Questions like this will eventually have the same impact on James.
LeBron, given your performances late in games in these Finals, what's your assessment of your ability to play well under pressure?
Does it bother you that so many people are happy to see you fail?
Do you take this as a personal failing?
Do you feel you choked in this series?
Those questions were aimed one after another at James, part of the same cruel process that made a champion out of Nowitzki. He arrived in the NBA as the "soft" European who could never win because he relied on jump shots and his team didn't defend. The years hardened and inspired him. He became one of the few big men in history to convert himself into a terrific low-post player toward the end of his career. He learned to hold his teammates accountable. He valued the arrival last summer of center Tyson Chandler, whose defensive leadership provided the final championship ingredient.
"This is one of the unique teams in NBA history," said Carlisle. "Because it wasn't about high-flying star power. Come on, how often do we have to hear about the LeBron James reality show and what he is or isn't doing? When are people going to talk about the purity of our game and what these guys accomplished? That's what's special. I played with Larry Bird, I played with Bill Walton, I played with Robert Parish, I played with Dennis Johnson, I played with the alltime greats. And Dirk is up there with that upper, upper echelon of great players.
"I kept having people come up to me the last three or four days [saying], 'Hey, there's billions of people rooting for you guys,'" said Carlisle. "And we could feel it, we could feel it. We knew it was very important that we won this series for those reasons -- because of what the game is about, and what the game should stand for. And I'm so, so proud to be a small part of that."
Billions? Probably not. But were millions of fans supporting Dallas against Miami? Definitely.
"They have made a statement that's a colossal statement," said Carlisle of his Mavs. "Not just about our team, but the game in general. Playing it a certain way. Trusting the pass. Playing collectively. Believing in each other. Our team is not about individual ability, it's about collective will, collective grit, collective guts. We're skilled and talented too, but our game is on the ground. And the guys we were playing, their game was in the air. Fortunately, as the series went on, we stayed on the ground enough to be able to win it."
Jason Kidd at 38 won the championship while transforming himself from the purest of point guards into a spot-up three-point shooter. Shawn Marion won the championship while leading the team defensive effort against James. J.J. Barea won the championship while piercing the Heat defense and eventually breaking into the paint to finish around the basket as bigger and more famous players had been unable to do throughout the playoffs against Miami. DeShawn Stevenson won the championship while making his first three threes amid his defense against Dwyane Wade (6-of-16 for 17 points). Jason Terry won the championship while going 11-for-16 for 27 points off the bench on a night when Nowitzki was going 1-for-12 in the first half.
They came into this series with so much in common. Neither James nor Nowitzki had won a championship, and each wanted desperately to win now at the expense of the other. How does a great player learn to channel that talent into desire, to turn frustration into success? James would finish Game 6 with 21 points on 15 shots and as many turnovers (six) as assists. By the third quarter his own fans were openly begging him to attack the basket, but the Mavs' mixture of man and zone defenses was not only preventing him from finishing in the lane, but dissuading him from even trying to go there.
Nowitzki's fans had felt the same frustration while watching him over the last several years. He had learned something powerful from that, and he had drawn strength from playing with the same teammates year after year. Altogether he and they built a championship team that James and his newly assembled Heat could not beat. As far as they had come in one season together, they hadn't had enough time to resolve issues that had taken the Mavericks' several years to overcome.
"I've been in this league eight years," said James at the end of his news conference. "There's no distractions that can stop me from trying to chase an NBA championship. Not you guys, not anything that goes on that's not focused on my team and my teammates and what we're out there to do what we set out to do."
He was talking faster. He was scowling, seething.
"I work hard to try to put myself in position to play at a high level," James went on, managing his emotions yet letting them be seen. "When you go out on the court, does the ball always go in? Absolutely not. But the one thing I know, I never hold my head low in saying I didn't do it the right way or I wish I would have did this. It's not about that.
"I put a lot of hard work into this season individually. We all did. So we have nothing to hang our heads low. Just use this as extra motivation to help myself become a better player for next year."
That was the last word from him, and the first step of following in the path of champions. Nowitzki was dressed to celebrate, with his bottle in one hand, his trophy in the other. For James, the work was just beginning.

Former WNBA Great Margo Dydek Dies

 
Former WNBA player Margo Dydek has died after suffering a heart attack at her home in Brisbane, Australia. She was 37. Dydek was the top WNBA draft pick in 1998, the second season for the women's pro league and played for the Utah Starzz (who moved to San Antonio), Connecticut and Los Angeles.
Dydek was also the tallest player ever to compete in the WNBA, and was fondly known as "Large Marge". Sports Illustrated says that's because she was 7'2" and still holds the record for most career blocks: 877 over 323 games. Born in Poland, Dydek had played for the Polish national team was coaching a development team in Australia, after a long career playing in the U.S. and Europe.
ESPN has a look at Dydek's accomplishments, noting her imposing height made it easy to dunk baskets, but she focused instead on her outside game - preferring to hit 3-pointers.
The AP reports Dydek was pregnant, but after suffering the heart attack she was placed in a medically induced coma and the child also died. She is survived by her husband David, and two young sons. Funeral details aren't known.
Deseret News columnist Brad Rock fondly remembers Dydek as a humble person who folded herself into a Chevy Cavalier, spoke several languages and was so popular with Utah Starzz fans she occasionally got double-booked for appearances.

NBA Finals Schedule 2011: Heat To Take On Mavericks

 
The Miami Heat will square off against the Dallas Mavericks in the 2011 NBA Finals. Miami will have home court advantage and the series will begin on Tuesday, May 31 at American Airlines Arena.
Dallas' Dirk Nowitzki has been unstoppable so far in the playoffs, averaging 28.4 points and 7.5 rebounds per game. After defeating the Trail Blazers in six games, the Mavs swept the Los Angeles Lakers and then eliminated the Oklahoma City Thunder in the Western Conference Finals.
The Heat, led by LeBron James and Dwyane Wade, beat the Philadelphia 76ers in the first round and then dominated the Boston Celtics in the second. The Heat finished off the top-seeded Chicago Bulls in the Eastern Conference Finals on Thursday.

orge Posada Apologizes To Yankees, Says ‘I Had A Bad Day’

NEW YORK (WFAN/AP) — Jorge Posada still has unwavering support in the Yankee Stadium stands. Now, a tumultuous weekend behind him, New York could use a few of those big hits he used to deliver all the time.
Posada apologized to the Yankees on Sunday for taking himself out of the lineup the day before, blaming the messy public spat with the team on this: “I had a bad day.”
“All the frustration came out,” said the slumping star, who met with manager Joe Girardi and general manager Brian Cashman and told them he was sorry. “It was just one of those days you wish you could take back.”
Posada was not in the starting lineup against Boston left-hander Jon Lester, but that was about strategy, not punishment. That said, the Yankees did contact the commissioner’s office during Saturday night’s blowup about possible recourse — a pursuit they’ve since dropped.
When the Red Sox went to their bullpen, Posada came off the bench. He entered as a pinch-hitter in the eighth inning late Sunday night, triggering a boisterous standing ovation, but couldn’t prevent the Yankees from losing their season-high fifth straight.

D'Alessandro: Chicago Bulls flex their muscle in Game 1

CHICAGO — By now, you probably have prepared yourself for the strong possibility that this playoff series will not always be an artistic triumph, despite Eric Spoelstra’s prediction (or was it his delusion?) that “at some point a basketball game will break out.”
Four quarters in, and we’re still waiting for that to happen for his Miami team. No doubt, there were long and competitive stretches Sunday night in which the Heat looked comfortable with the grunt game that the Chicago Bulls play so well. But that was a mirage.
Whether they are equipped to play this kind of game remains to be seen, but they had better learn quickly that this series will be decided by the coach who can get his team to lock in longer defensively. In this particular instance, that team was Chicago, and for 48 minutes it was a masterpiece of the art.
That was the lesson from Game 1, a 103-82 Chicago blowout, and it was a sight to behold. The Bulls were more precise, more intense, more dedicated to making certain that every last stop was brought to its conclusion, with their four main bigs snatching more rebounds than the entire Miami team.
It didn’t hurt, either, that Derrick Rose played like the MVP and that honorary Jersey guy Luol Deng — a Blair Academy product — outplayed LeBron James by a substantial margin.
Or that every last guy off Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau’s bench was a game-changer.
Or that there was a 45-33 blowout on the glass, and a 31-8 landslide in second-chance points.
Etc., etc.
Some coaches would call it beautiful, and that’s their right. But when you lose, you think otherwise, and even Chris Bosh had to admit, “We took a beating tonight.”
So while it doesn’t change our opinion that the Heaters are the better group here, let’s just say that the Bulls now have their full attention.
This is worth noting because after it was over, one of the first things out of Thibodeau’s mouth was, “There are things we have to clean up defensively.” Nothing is left to chance with this guy, and every mistake elicits coaching castigation.
Think of it this way: Chicago scored its first three times out of the gate in the second half, and even though Bosh had just blown by Joakim Noah for a lefty score, the Bulls had their largest lead (55-50) of the game.
But Dwyane Wade then found a seam for a score, and James set up a Bosh jam off a side screen/roll that was too quick for the help (Boozer) to stop this from happening.
They hadn’t even played three minutes in the second half, but what did Thibodeau do? He called timeout, probably to reinforce the no-layup rule, as the Bulls had now yielded three straight layups.
“We were spread out,” he explained later. “As ball goes away, we have to handle the weak side better. And our ball pressure wasn’t where we wanted it to be.”
What happened from there was extraordinary. The Heat took their final lead at 58-57 on James’ 20-foot turnaround fadeaway with Deng in his mug, but that’s where Thibodeau’s defense shut Miami’s water off.
The 3-pointers by Rose and Keith Bogans started the train rolling, but the real work was at the other end: Miami shot 2-for-9 the rest of the period with three turnovers, as blocks in the paint by Noah and Taj Gibson (on Wade and James, respectively), brought the house down.
And then, just to prove it was no fluke, Chicago’s second unit held Miami to 1-for-4 with a turnover to start the fourth quarter, with a 3-point fling from C.J. Watson making it an 83-66 runaway.
“They simply overwhelmed us,” Spoelstra said. “They’re an excellent defensive team. Losing a lot of those effort areas really deflated us, and we lost concentration on the offensive end, and it got away from us.”
There’s no denying it: There is enough star-based electricity in this series to generate enough power for a medium-sized city.
And this is not likely to devolve into a retrograde smackdown that only Vince McMahon would feel comfortable promoting.
But the Panhandle Series out West will be the more interesting one from an offensive standpoint. Among those remaining in the Final Four, Dallas is executing best, and if Kevin Durant has one of those can’t-touch-this weeks from the outer limits, those are games that are going to be played into the one-teens.
The Eastern encounter is not going there, judging by the first 48 minutes — and by Miami’s ability to learn on the fly.
“In the playoffs, there aren’t good performances and bad performances,” Spoelstra said. “There are wins and losses.”
But Chicago has established the style it will win with. It’s remarkably effective, and historically proven. Pat Riley, long before he put this Heat team together, called them “big muscle activities.” Thibodeau’s team might be the paradigm.

Thunder tie NBA playoffs with triple overtime win

Oklahoma City regained the home-court advantage that the Grizzlies had snatched and now host game five on Wednesday.
"This game is something people are going to be talking about for a while," Durant said. "I'm glad I'm a part of it."
"We've got to keep fighting though," Durant added. "It's tied up right now. We're taking it back to our house. So we'll see how we handle it."
Russell Westbrook led the Thunder with 40 points. James Harden added 19, and Daequan Cook chipped in 10.
The Grizzlies, playing to a packed house despite the floods that have swelled the Mississippi River and forced evacuations in some Memphis areas, looked weary in the third over-time, making just one of their nine shots from the floor.
Zach Randolph led the Grizzlies with 34 points and 16 rebounds and Marc Gasol added 26 points and 21 rebounds in the losing effort. O.J. Mayo had 18 and Mike Conley 16 before both fouled out. Greivis Vasquez had 14.
The winner of this series will play the Dallas Mavericks in the Western Conference finals for a chance to face a team from the East for the NBA crown.
The Mavericks have a chance to rest up after ousting the two-time defending NBA champion Los Angeles Lakers in the minimum four games.
The Memphis-Oklahoma City series, in contrast, is a dog-fight. Monday's nail-biter came just two days after the Grizzlies edged the Thunder in over-time.
Conley forced the first over-time with his only three-pointer of the game. Vasquez, the rookie who came in after Conley and Mayo fouled out late in the first extra period, hit a three-pointer to set up the second over-time. Gasol's tip-in set up the third over-time.
"We thought it was destined for us to win, but ain't nothing given to you in the NBA," Randolph said. "You've got to go out and take it."
The Thunder had chances to win at the end of regulation and the first two extra periods.
Durant, the NBA scoring champion, saw a three-pointer miss at the end of the first over-time and Westbrook's leaning long-range jump shot brushed the rim at the buzzer to end the second over-time.
Oklahoma City took charge in the third extra period, when Westbrook's basket with 3:38 remaining put them ahead for good.
Durant added a pair of free throws and his running lay-up gave the Thunder a 129-123 lead with less than a minute to play.
Durant stole the ball from Randolph on the other end and made a shot over Shane Battier with 29.3 seconds left.
The Grizzlies can look back and regret letting an early 18-point lead slip.
Oklahoma City could have put it away sooner, too, surrendering a 10-point fourth-quarter lead.
Memphis coach Lionel Hollins was impressed with the fight shown by each team.
"Both teams kept coming back and fighting and fighting and fighting. It became a matter of just not having enough bullets as the game wore on," Hollins said.
"I commend both teams for the effort that they gave and the way they stuck with it and just fought. Nobody wanted to go home. Nobody wanted to lose."

Westbrook, Thunder beat fatigue, Grizzlies to win Game 4 marathon

MEMPHIS, Tenn. -- Kevin Durant shuffled his sneakered feet slowly down a dimly lit hallway, head bowed, every ounce of energy drained from his 6-foot-9, 230-pound frame. It was Durant's shot, a feathery 19-footer, his 20th of the night, his team's 95th of the game, that sealed Oklahoma City's 133-123 triple overtime victory, ending a marathon 3-hour, 52-minute war and squaring the Thunder's suddenly gripping second-round series with Memphis at two games apiece.
"56 minutes," Durant said. "I don't think I've ever been this tired."
Years from now, when gray hairs outnumber dark ones in these young Thunder players chins, they will remember this. Their bodies won't let them forget. Kendrick Perkins called this one of the most physical series he has ever played in and the body language of his teammates inside the Oklahoma City locker room backed up his words. James Harden (49 minutes) collapsed in the back of his locker. Nick Collison (34 minutes) doing the same. Perkins (34 minutes) hunched over in a chair, ice bags on both knees, a drained look on his face.
"I've been in some battles with Dwight Howard," Perkins said. "This is really physical."
This is what this series has become: a knock down, drag out brawl between two teams that refuse to give each other an inch. For 63 grueling minutes Memphis played power ball, dumping it in to Zach Randolph (34 points in 56 minutes) and Marc Gasol (26 points in 57 minutes), flexing their formidable muscle in the paint. Oklahoma City hit back with Perkins, Collison and Serge Ibaka, turning a basketball game into a bruising battle.
"Every ounce of energy that you had in your body, you gave it to your team," said Thunder coach Scott Brooks. Russell Westbrook sure did. The point guard's erratic play has been a debated storyline throughout this series. But with Tony Allen and Shane Battier draped all over Durant for most of the game, Westbrook went on the offensive. Few of his 40 points (on 15-of-33 shooting) came easy; most ended with an airborne Westbrook crashing to the floor. He added seven assists and seven rebounds to his final line which, most importantly, showed just three turnovers in 51 minutes.
"I played point guard for a long time in this league and I know when things don't go well, the coach and the point guard always get the blame," Brooks said. "We needed his scoring. I thought [Westbrook] was terrific tonight."
Brooks credited a film session at the team hotel on Sunday. In an animated, 75-minute meeting the team dissected video of Game 3, a forgettable performance in which the Thunder blew a 16-point lead and lost in overtime. As the coaching staff sat in silence, the players, Perkins said, "let some things out."
"Guys let each other know how they felt," Perkins said.
"We wanted to talk about what went wrong," Brooks said. "And everyone participated. I love when guys have great dialogue with each other. I tell the guys 'it's not my way, it's not your way, it's finding the best way to get the team to get prepared for the next game.' That's the great thing about film. It's the truth box. It tells you the truth every time."
The truth, Brooks said, was that somewhere along the line the Thunder forgot how to close out games. Westbrook got sloppy. Durant struggled to get free. But when Mike Conley and Greivis Vasquez tossed in improbable shots to prolong Game 4, Oklahoma City refused to fold. In the second overtime it was Westbrook (seven points) taking over and in the third OT Durant (six) was there to close the show. In each Thunder huddle in the overtimes was Perkins, his low voice bellowing "lock in" over and over in their ears.
"I saw toughness in their eyes at the end," Brooks said. "They could have easily said 'this isn't meant to be.' They were exhausted. Our guys have an amazing ability to play with a competitive spirit. I haven't been around many young players like that."
Oklahoma City reclaimed home court advantage on Monday. Keeping it, however, won't be a simple task. They know Memphis will be there on Wednesday, pounding the ball inside, beating on them with blunt force and brute strength.
"They got a lot of reasons to hate us," Perkins said. "It's exciting. It's good playoff basketball. It's two teams playing with a lot of pride trying to get it done."

Lamar Odom says he will start

 
Lamar Odom said at the team's shootaround on Friday that he will start at small forward in place of Ron Artest, who is suspended for one game following his late hit to the face of Dallas Mavericks guard J.J. Barea in Game 2.
"I'll try to fill another role," said Odom.
The news comes as a surprise considering the Lakers used the lineup of Odom, Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum on the court together for less than three total minutes during the regular season.
"I don't think it will be much of an adjustment," Odom said of the frontcourt that would run 6-foot-10, 7-foot, 7-foot with him, Gasol and Bynum. "We all know how to play basketball. We'll try to make the floor as small as possible. Make them beat us over the top [on defense].
"Usually that's not how we've played ... but we all know each other and we've played with each other and we know what to expect. We'll just go out and try to win a basketball game at this point."
Said Gasol: "It's not a lineup that is used regularly or often; only in need. I guess we are in need now."
The Lakers trail the Mavericks 2-0 in the second-round series.
While Odom would be listed at small forward, he would play more of a guard's role on offense when paired on the court with Kobe Bryant, allowing Bryant to attack from the wing.

With Fourth-Quarter Rally, Mavericks Push Jackson and Lakers to Brink

DALLAS — Phil Jackson and Kobe Bryant share not only five Lakers championships, but also splits, make-ups, power struggles, reinventions and redemptions.
It is fitting that Jackson’s final postseason would encounter bumps, that another hurdle to be crossed awaited him, Bryant told Jackson Friday morning.
Jackson then offered a distinction. “But it’s not me crossing it,” he said before the third game of their Western Conference semifinal series against the Dallas Mavericks. “It’s the team.”
Jackson is perhaps mentally preparing for what is likely his final separation between himself and the Lakers. The Mavericks shoved Jackson one loss further toward retirement and the two-time defending champion Lakers one loss closer to playoff elimination by administering a 98-92 loss to them on Friday.
Dirk Nowitzki has proved unguardable in the series and replicated his performance from the first two games by delivering 32 points on Wednesday. His five-footer with 1 minute 23 seconds left in the fourth quarter broke a tie and cemented another Lakers collapse.
Lamar Odom, who started in place of the suspended Ron Artest, missed a jumper on the Lakers’ possession. The Dallas reserve Jason Terry, who scored 23 points, latched onto Peja Stojakovic’s miss and was fouled by the Lakers’ Derek Fisher. He went to the free-throw line and iced the win with two free throws and 18 seconds remaining.
The Lakers again played the final moments disorientated and disorganized and are now in disarray. They left 3-point shooters open and often failed to drive the lane in a game they could have won. Bryant did not seize control of the contest and finished with 17 points on 13 shots.
No N.B.A. playoff team has ever rallied from the 3-0 playoff deficit now facing the Lakers. The Mavericks can shut the door on Jackson’s coaching career — which includes six championships in Chicago — by winning Sunday’s Game 4 here and gaining the Western Conference finals.
For the Lakers, it looks like a stunning drop from the N.B.A.’s top tier. They have played in the last three N.B.A. finals. Despite wavering at times this season, many expected them to return there again, offering Jackson a proper sendoff. When Jackson decided to return last summer, he said in a statement: “It’ll be the last stand for me, and I hope a grand one.” He has not questioned that decision throughout the course of the season.
The Lakers allowed Dallas to erase an 8-point lead in the fourth quarter with two 3-point shots from Stojakovic and one from Nowitzki. Nowtizki’s free throws provided Dallas a lead for the first time in the second half, 88-87, with 2:40 left in the fourth quarter. Bryant again had miscues that cost the Lakers late by turning the ball over with 3:23 left and missing a 23-foot jumper in the Lakers’ next possession.