Wolves at Houston
Posted on March 26th, 2008 – 7:34 PMBy Jerry Zgoda
After getting plump on opponents who have as little to play for as they do, the Wolves tonight enter a six-game stretch where they play playoff-bound opponents. All but Detroit at home next Tuesday are Western Conference teams desperate to secure seeding or just to keep themselves from plummeting out of the ridiculously competitive playoff hunt outright.
Tonight is Kirk Snyder’s first game back since the Rockets traded him last month for Gerald Green, and gave the Wolves a 2010 second-round pick and cash to boot for a player whom they cut barely two weeks later.
It also is the second time this month that NBA commissioner David Stern is in the house. He is here on a night when the Rockets honor 16-year veteran Dikembe Mutombo for his playing career and his humanitarian effort. Don’t call it a retirement party — although Stern joked that he thought he was here for Mutombo’s “60th birthday party — because Mutombo hasn’t decided if he will return for another season next year yet.
Stern chatted with reporters before the game and among the topics of conversations:
*A general manager called him with this suggestion on how to address the disparity between the Western Conference’s torrid playoff race and the Eastern Conference’s tepid one: Eight teams from each conference still qualify for the playoffs, but teams are seeded 1 through 16 with no regard to the conference they play in. That could mean, say, a first-round series between Portland and Boston. Stern didn’t dismiss the idea out of hand, saying it’s possible in this era where teams have their own planes, and said it would be discussed further later this spring.
*As he said when visited Salt Lake City for the Wolves-Jazz game earlier this month, the SuperSonics are goners from Seattle. The only question is whether they will move to Oklahoma City for next season and spend two lame-duck seasons in Seattle until their arena lease expires.
*He’d like to see college players spend two seasons there before being eligible for the NBA draft — right now it’s just one season — but that, of course, is subject to collective-bargaining with the players union.
15 Responses to "Wolves at Houston"
I would like to see him ban Kevin McHale from Basketball, but that’s probably not going to happen.
If the NBA is going to fiddle with the playoff teams, then they need to balance the schedule more. Would the Celtics and Pistons be the #1 and #2 overall seeds if they played more games against the West? Boston, maybe, but likely not Detroit.
ha ha ha. no thats not going to happen. besides, McHale has made great moves of late. imagine that. experience increases and so does good moves. never would’ve thought.
i agree w/sean. if they take on that type of playoff seed then every team needs to play every team an equal amount of times. lot more complicated than simply re-seeding the playoff structure. the whole season structure would have to change.
Ya great, Mchale has made a couple good moves in a row and it only took him what 10 years of experience to actually make one good move?? Good job Mchale, your awesome
Whats the good move?
yes experience does wonderful things. so drafting KG wasn’t a good move? hmmm…
snyder, a 2nd round pick, and cash for green. steal.
It’s only a “steal” if Snyder resigns here and plays well under his new deal.
It’s only a steal if the 2nd round pick turns out to be either a useful player or a pick that can be traded that then turns into a useful player. Otherwise it is just garbage in garbage out.
Hey now…Green wasn’t garbage…I do like Synder but would rather have Green and his unlimited potential…If McHale was smart he’d pick Green back up and add that to the list of players he still has for KG
Green and his so-called “unlimited potential” wasn’t getting squat done on the court. Snyder was able to walk in here and get big minutes right away. That ought to indicate something.
He sure played a hell of alot better than Brewer….and besides that was when McHale and Co. was playing Walker 25 plus minutes a game…Green never got a chance…
Green wasn’t garbage? What was he then? He played absolutely no defense. If it’s possible he played negative defense. Plus he couldn’t run the offense. He is very athletic but so was Darius Miles.
As bad as Brewer’s shooting has been, I’d still take him over Green without thinking twice. And if you check the numbers, you’d see that when he did play, Green was shooting even worse than Brewer.
Ya thats because all Green wanted to do is shoot 3’s and fadeaway jumpers, neither of which hardly ever went in.
He had to jack 3’s because he never played unless the team was down by 20 pts
