Where Are They Now, 2010; Part 10
January 10th, 2010
– Rick Brunson The last time we checked in on Eric Daniel Brunson, he was the director of men’s basketball operations at the University of Virginia. He’s moved now, however. After Virginia head coach Dave Leitao resigned last April, Brunson took over the head coaching role until his replacement was announced, a role that didn’t involve a huge amount of coaching as their season had already finished. Once the handover was completed, Brunson left the program and became an assistant coach at Hartford, where he remains. – John Bryant Bryant went undrafted out of Santa Clara on the basis that he was too slow for the NBA. He went to the Kings for summer league, but played only eight minutes, even after Spencer Hawes decided not to turn up; Bryant then went to the D-League, where he averages 13.7 points, 10.9 rebounds and 1.5 blocks per game for the Erie BayHawks. The rebounds rank fourth in the league, and two of the three ahead of him are NBA assignees (Joey Dorsey and D.J. White). However, he also averages four fouls in only 34 minutes. – Greg Buckner Buckner was waived by the Mavericks in training camp and has not signed elsewhere since. His unguaranteed salary would have been a pretty awesome trade chip at the deadline, but the Mavericks – already with Erick Dampier’s unguaranteed contract for next year, Josh Howard’s team option, Drew Gooden’s expiring/unguaranteed and Shawne Williams’s expiring – figured they had enough trade chips already. To be honest, I think they should have kept Buckner’s unguaranteed over Williams’s expiring, as the value of that unguaranteed would have been magnified in this economy. But I guess even the Mavericks have a budget limit, which is fair enough. Remember the Love Mayo trade on draft night 2008? […]
A.D. Vassallo Made Me Have An Epiphany
July 27th, 2009
As you might presently yourself fully be aware of, one of the specialist areas that this website focuses on is on the life, times, careers and skillsets of players on the fringes of the NBA. (The other specialisms are; the NBA salaries and all the technical aspects that go along with them, references to English things that you don’t really understand, overly complicated wordplay, and stealing jokes from Family Guy. So, something for everyone there.) The spectrum of the site runs broader than that, and tries to encapsulate everything NBA related, but those are the areas of particular focus. I try to bring you things that you can’t get elsewhere in the online NBA world, and ne’er more so is this true than in the scrub tracking. It’s something that I love to do in life. Some men go to sleep at night holding their loved ones; I go to bed at night holding import player’s rebounding statistics from the last Chinese Basketball Association season. (Not really. But you get the idea.) Following the fringe is pretty much all I do, so much so that I had to visit Google to remind me of what the word “loved one” means. Oh and believe me, the internet carries that information. Maybe it’s because of my nation’s jingoistic identity as a perennial lover of the underdog, but since day one of my NBA fandom, something has always drawn me to the players nearer the end of the bench more than the good ones. My “favourite NBA players of all time” list includes Rick Brunson, Fred Hoiberg, Chris Jefferies and Marcus Fizer, for God’s sake. I even have Fizer’s name on a jersey somewhere. Perhaps I should sell it back to him. One of the most grating aspects of this devotion, though, is […]
Where Are They Now, 2009; Part 8
January 8th, 2009
A lot of people are called Brown, I’ve noticed. How fascinating. – Dee Brown started the year with the Wizards, but was then waived when it emerged that he wasn’t the answer to Washington’s pretty severe outside shooting problems. He then went to a Suns mini-camp, where he beat out Eddie Gill, Damon Stoudamire, Darrell Armstrong, Walker Russell and Troy Hudson to win Phoenix’s mandatory 13th roster spot. He’s since been waived again this week, due to the mandatory contract guarantee date of January 10th. The Suns, seemingly, are going to do what they so love doing – keeping the bare minimum of players at all times, going to twelve as and when they can, to avoid paying out as little money as possible. This from the team that traded away Rudy Fernandez and Rajon Rondo just to save money, and who then gave Goran Dragic more than either of them. Even the Jason Richardson trade saved them money, It kind of makes you squirm, doesn’t it? – I’ve been literally inundated with one request for news on Elton Brown. Oddly, that request comes from someone who already knows the answer. But let’s play along anyway. After spending the preseason with the Chicago Bulls, and having trouble getting a shot away without it being blocked by a defender and/or the rim, Elton went to Israeli powerhouse Maccabi Tel-Aviv, hoping to be good again. However, Elton appeared in only one game, scoring two points with two rebounds, before it was announced in late December that Maccabi were releasing him, supposedly because they were disappointed with his conditioning. Whether he has actually left yet, I’m not sure, but he’s not playing with the team, and any remaining chance of some dramatic turnaround with the team is going to be made […]
30 teams in 36 or so days: New York Knicks
September 29th, 2007
Players acquired via free agency or trade: Zach Randolph (acquired from Portland) Dan Dickau (acquired from Portland) Fred Jones (acquired from Portland) Players acquired via draft: First round: Wilson Chandler (23rd overall) Second round: Demetris Nichols (53rd overall, rights acquired from Portland, not yet signed) Players retained: Malik Rose (opted in) Players departed: Kelvin Cato (unsigned) Channing Frye (traded to Portland) Steve Francis (traded to Portland) Bobbins: If he has not done so already, Isiah Thomas needs to write an autobiography. Actually, he needs to write about three. One about his time as a player, one as a General Manager, and one for amusing miscellany. I can safely say without a shadow of a doubt that I would buy all three. Not even a moment’s hesitation needed. And I think the same applies to about half of you. Maybe give him his own TV channel, and just run endless documentaries on him. I’d watch them. There’s just too much stuff going on at all times where Isiah Thomas is concerned. Win or lose (but normally lose), these Isiah-led Knicks have been an absolute fixture at the top of the NBA’s “did you hear this?” listings. From the moment he took over, ‘forfeiting’ the ‘future’ of the franchise by trading for Stephon Marbury (the notion that Milos Vujanic constituted most of the Knicks future is still funny), Isiah has continued to dumbfound, amaze and amuse in equal measures. Whether it be by making the type of trade for which they had to invent their own category (“A Trade Only Isiah Could Make”), or for one of many stories that come out about him (such as his role in instigating the brawl against Denver, or wanting to kill Bill Simmons, which is the Tarantino film they never made […]
