Pippen, with the flat-top fade, posterizes Ewing...

Trade Rumour: Indiana sends SF Ron Artest to Sacramento for SF Peja Stojakovic…

Gone…Pacers SF Jonathan Bender will announce his retirement today or tomorrow due to bone-on-bone pain in his knees…the 7’0” 225 lb. Bender was a 1st round draft pick of the Raptors in 1999 out of high school who was traded to the Pacers for PF Antonio Davis…with career averages of 5.6 PPG and 2.2 RPg, Bender never came close to fulfilling his potential having been injured for 213 of the 450 games of his short career…

Super-Duper underground darkhorse in the NBA’s dunk contest this year? Cavs backup PG Mike Wilks…Lebron James calls him the best dunker for a small man (5’10”) he’s ever seen…

LBJ goes platinum…Lebron scored an NBA season-high 52 points but his Cavs still lost to the Bucks 111-106 on Saturday night as T.J. Ford tied his career high with 24 and Michael Redd added 23. James was 19-for-29 from the field, 5-of-9 from three and 9-for-10 from the line. "I don't want to score 50 again for the rest of my career because I am now 0-2 when I score 50," James joked after the game. "I don't look at it as me playing well. It's the fact that we didn't get a win and that's all I care for." James, who also had seven assists and seven defensive rebounds, had 31 points in the first half on 13-of-17 shooting and 3-of-4 from the 3-point line.

So much for Texas…Duke SG J.J. Redick had 41 points, including 9 3-pointers as No. 1 Duke beat No. 2 Texas 97-66 on Saturday, the third-biggest margin in a No. 1 vs. No. 2 matchup. "J.J. is a special player, as good as they come," Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski said of the returning All-America.

1) Scottie Pippen’s jersey was retired on Saturday night…ESPN.com writers and analysts -- including two former teammates -- to tell us what they would remember about his career:

Pippen was MJ's No. 2, but one ofa kind

Will Perdue, ESPN Insider: You know what they say, be careful what you wish for -- you just might get it. Scottie, like most people, wanted to be the man. Well, he got it all right. Michael all of a sudden retires in 1993 after the death of his father, and Scottie, by default, becomes the man. What I don't think he realized is what comes with being the man. You're responsible for answering to the media when the team falters; you're the one to blame if a teammate breaks ranks; you're the one ... the list goes on. The pressure got to Scottie. He did some things he's undoubtedly not proud of. Fast-forward to the 2000-01 season. I join Scottie in Portland as a free agent to finish my career. On paper, we had a very good team. What I didn't realize was how this team was on the verge of imploding. What I saw, though, was a familiar face trying his hardest to keep this team together. I saw a guy who was older, wiser and willing to sacrifice for the good of the team. He had obviously been paying attention to his previous mistakes. Could this guy possibly be the same guy I knew years before? The only thing about this guy that was the same was his looks. Scottie had become that leader we had expected years earlier. More mature. More aware of that which goes on around him. The problem: his teammates didn't want to listen. They thought they had the answers, not the guy with six rings. Not the guy who had learned from the league's best player of all time. Scottie tried to help the coaches with this team, but to no avail. Who knows what would have happened if the guys had listened? Maybe even the organization would be in a better place now. It's unfortunate that Scottie was not given the opportunity to lead that Blazers team like he should have led the Bulls. It was obvious to me that he was trying to make amends for his previous mistakes. I just wish he had had more willing teammates. It would have been a fitting way to end his career. Not a lot of people know that about Scottie. But I saw the transformation firsthand. It's too bad more people did not get to see it: Scottie had become a complete player.

Jim O'Brien, ESPN Insider: To play second fiddle is a challenge in any walk of life. Whether in an orchestra or on a basketball court, it calls for people to subordinate themselves to someone else who is held in a higher esteem or whose skills are just a cut above. Scottie Pippen was the best second fiddle in the history of the NBA. He played much of his career in the shadow of Michael Jordan, arguably the greatest player in the history of the game. In the 1988-89 season, I was an assistant coach with the New York Knicks and we found ourselves down by one to the Bulls, in Chicago, with the ball. There were just under 10 seconds left in the game. Rick Pitino called timeout, and we advanced the ball into the frontcourt to set up the last shot and hopefully steal a road win. Pitino's instructions were simple. Whoever was being guarded by Jordan should lift him above the top of the key on the right side (you could do that before the defensive rules changed) opposite Patrick Ewing, who was going to post on the left block. The play was designed to have Ewing downscreen to free up the wing that was not being guarded by Jordan. Our wing would catch it and simply dump it in to Ewing who would shoot one of his patented turnaround jumpers. There was only one problem. A second-year player named Pippen was guarding the other wing. Pippen was able to pressure the wing higher than we wanted our guy to catch it and harassed him into a weak pass to Ewing. The softness of the pass made Ewing catch it farther off the lane than he wanted the ball. Pippen's pressure threw off the timing, and when Ewing turned toward the baseline to shoot his jumper Jordan blocked it at the buzzer. As usual, Jordan's athleticism, coming from the other side of the floor astounded everyone. But it was the pressure by his newly emerging sidekick -- playing second fiddle -- that allowed Jordan to make the block. In 1994-95, the two of them became the only teammates to be named to the All-NBA first team and the All-Defensive first team in the same season. Jordan had this to say when they were both named to the NBA's 50 Greatest Players of all time: "Scottie Pippen has got to be considered one of the best all-around players in the game. When one phase of his game is not on key, he's able to contribute in other ways. I think that's the sign of greatness."

Tim Legler, ESPN Insider: I was playing for the Washington Bullets in 1997 when we met the Chicago Bulls in the first round of the playoffs. The Bulls featured Pippen, Michael Jordan, Dennis Rodman and Ron Harper. We got swept, but each game was decided in the final minute. That team was one of the greatest defensive teams in NBA history. The thing I remember most about Pippen in that series and throughout his career was that he was the most versatile defender I had ever seen. He guarded our point guards, wings and post players. He had the quickness, length and strength to take away an entire side of the court. For that reason, I will always think of Scottie Pippen as the most dominant team defensive player in history. Amazingly, although Pippen was voted one of the 50 greatest players in NBA history in 1997, I still think he has been underrated in terms of his impact on winning six championships because he was the second option to Michael Jordan. I will always view Scottie Pippen as one of the best all-around players to ever play the game.

Greg Anthony, ESPN Insider: When you talk about Scottie Pippen, the word that comes to mind for me is evolution. The evolution of a leader. You hear all the time about guys who are born leaders; well, that description doesn't fit Scottie. He evolved into a leader. Playing alongside the greatness of Michael Jordan, a dominating personality, could have stunted one's growth. This, in my estimation, is what escalates Pippen's status as truly one of the greats of all time. He was able to create his own niche and allowed his success to do his talking. Having played with Scottie for a couple of years in Portland and through all the battles against his Bulls when I was with the Knicks, I am familiar with all the criticism and talk of his lack of toughness and the like. I'm here to tell you it's because of this that I was able to truly appreciate just how amazing a player he was. You've probably heard me say this before, but Michael Jordan, the greatest basketball player who ever lived, never won a single championship without Scottie Pippen. Enough said.

Chris Broussard, ESPN The Magazine: When I think of Scottie Pippen, two words come to mind: ultimate sidekick. It's often said that Michael Jordan never won a title without Pippen, and while I believe Jordan would have won multiple titles with any All-Star-caliber player in Pippen's role, I do believe Pippen was the perfect second guy for MJ. He was perfect because, first of all, he didn't want to be The Man. That may have been because of his humble basketball beginnings. Tim Duncan once told me he has no problem with Spurs coach Gregg Popovich yelling at him and treating him like every other player because he was never the star, or a prodigy, as a youngster or as a college recruit. His early life as "just another player" made it easy for him to accept being treated that way even as he emerged into a superstar. I believe Pippen's background at tiny Central Arkansas molded him into a great supporting actor. Coming out of Central Arkansas, albeit as the fifth pick in the '87 draft, must have made Pippen feel fortunate just to be in the league, especially next to Michael Jordan. He wasn't trying to usurp Jordan's position; he was happy to be along for the ride. In the 1993-94 season, of course, Pippen showed he didn't have the mental makeup to be The Man. He had the game. That year, he averaged career highs of 22 points and 8.7 rebounds (plus 5.6 assists) while leading a Jordan-less Bulls crew to 55 wins. But inside, he longed for MJ to return and make him the second banana once again. Pippen was also perfect for Jordan because of his skills. I remember watching Pippen in his third season, when he broke out and averaged 16 points a game. I thought to myself, "He looks like he patterned his entire game after Jordan's." The way he moved and penetrated, everything, looked like an MJ knockoff (in a good way). And Pippen played some of the best defense ever. Anyone who has ever played competitive basketball knows how nauseating it is to have a quick, long-armed defender covering you like perspiration. Pippen was so good at it that even the great Magic Johnson had trouble handling his pressure in the 1991 NBA Finals. Being a topflight sidekick is no easy gig. Not everyone can do it, as we saw in L.A. with Shaq and Kobe. But if more players were willing to be Pippenesque rather than trying to be Jordanesque, there would be better teams in the league and less soap opera-type drama.

John Hollinger, ESPN Insider: Scottie Pippen's legacy is so heavily connected with the Chicago Bulls that it's easy to forget he spent four solid seasons in Portland and, but for a Game 7 collapse in the 2000 Western Conference finals, might easily have won a seventh ring there. As a Blazer, Pippen had no Michael Jordan to whom he could defer. Instead the team's many youngsters looked up to him for leadership, but it wasn't his style to provide it, either on or off the court. Pippen was a lead-by-example guy who worked hard, played hurt and stayed quiet. He was the consummate pro and perhaps the greatest complementary player ever, but not the type to give erratic teammates like Rasheed Wallace and Bonzi Wells a much-needed slap upside the head. Partly because of that, my favorite memory of Pippen's time in the Rose City was one of the few times he did grab the spotlight, in Game 5 of the 2000 conference semifinals against Utah. With the Blazers trailing 79-77 in the final seconds and Scottie dazed after Arvydas Sabonis inadvertently knocked him silly, it looked as though the series was heading back to Utah for Game 6. But instead of doing the Blazerly thing and throwing a towel at Sabonis, Pippen stayed in the game and brought the ball upcourt for the Blazers' final shot. When he noticed Bryon Russell sagging off him to defend a pass to Wallace in the post, Pippen surprised everyone by pulling up for 3. Since Pippen was a 32.6 percent career 3-point shooter, was standing at least a foot behind the line and still had plenty of time on the clock, the crowd reacted nervously as he launched the shot. But the Rose Garden exploded when the ball found the net, and the game-winning 3-pointer with 7.3 seconds left sent Portland to its second straight Western Conference finals.

Marc Stein, ESPN.com senior writer: Chances are Scottie Pippen will never make my list of favorite sidekicks. All those slots are taken by my brothers from the Dallas Sidekicks However ... Even Scottie's biggest critics can safely dish him one of the highest conceivable compliments: Pip was the ideal complement to Michael Jordan. You can focus, if you wish, on the 1.8 seconds he refused to play against the Knicks ... or how his Rockets experiment with Hakeem Olajuwon and Charles Barkley backfired spectacularly ... or how he couldn't hold the combustible Trail Blazers together during a history-changing Game 7 collapse against the Shaq-and-Kobe Lakers that almost certainly cost Pippen a seventh championship ring. It's all on Pippen's résumé in permanent ink, but nothing he failed to achieve on his own changes the fact that Pippen's all-around game made MJ a better player. There's not a long list of guys who can say that.

Ken Shouler, ESPN.com NBA historian: After Scottie Pippen's career ground down in anonymity in Houston, Portland and another run in Chicago, a person asked me whether I would still rank him in the all-time top 50. "Yes," I told him. I explained that if you pick 20 guards, 20 forwards and 10 centers and exclude him, then you're arguing that there are 20 forwards in NBA history who had better careers than Pippen. There weren't 20 then and aren't 20 still. Pippen's versatile career stands the test of time. That's because he played a complete game, averaging 19 points, 7 rebounds and 5 assists over 11 years in Chicago. Those rounded figures are rarely duplicated by forwards in any period. Then there's the defense. Pippen was an NBA All-Defensive first team selection eight times, a distinction he shares with only one other forward, Bobby Jones. Letting Pippen harass Magic Johnson in the 1991 Finals was vitally important to Chicago's first championship. When assistant coach Johnny Bach later said, "We unleash the Dobermans" on defense, he had in mind Jordan and Pippen. Still, people downgrade his career, primarily because he didn't win without Jordan. So Scottie Pippen was "a vice president but not a president," as Gary Payton once put it. There's nothing wrong with a great vice president whose versatility was crucial -- even irreplaceable -- to six title teams.

2) Chris Sheriden of ESPN.comwith a terrific Q & A with Pippen:

Pippen on playing with Jordan, his highs and his lows

ESPN.com: Let's start with your number, 33. Do you remember the circumstances of you picking it, or why you picked it?

Scottie Pippen: As a child I used to watch the Lakers a lot, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, watching Larry Bird earlier in his career, so that one just kind of stuck out for me.

ESPN.com: Was there a particular player you liked to pattern your defensive style after? Or did that kind of come to you as you learned as you went along?

Pippen: I think that just sort of came to me as I went along. I think one thing about my game that I sort of carried on my own was really playing defense. I learned a lot from the coaching staff in Chicago, and throughout my collegiate [career], I learned from my coaches. But there's not really anyone that I can say that I watched, any player in the league that I tried to pattern my defensive skill after.

ESPN.com: When you're learning a defensive skill or how to be a great defender, what are the things you can work on? It's a difficult thing to coach, and every player, based on skills, quickness, length, whatever, does it a little differently. But how are you able to concentrate on being a great defender?

Pippen: Well, you always have to give the offensive player the leeway. That's first and foremost. That's the most important thing, to try to use your speed to your advantage. I always tried to be a guy that did a lot more backpedaling, giving the offensive player the cushion, knowing I had the speed, I had the length and the size to recover from any position. So, it's really just about anticipation as well, as I said, always giving the offensive player the leeway and picking your moments when you can be aggressive.

ESPN.com: Who would you say the top three defenders are right now in the league?

Pippen: Are you talking about shot-blockers or are you talking about guys who can get out and defend the ball? To me, it's very difficult for any guy to defend with the way I've watched the game over the last 10 years, because of the rule changes and the fact that there's no more hand-checking. You really can't do much more than try to guide a guy, or try to turn him, make him go in another direction. The game is now more geared for the offensive player.

ESPN.com: When you think about your legacy, I'm sure you know the people around the league respect your defensive capabilities, and that's one of the first things they point to, even if the general fan didn't have quite an appreciation for that. How much do you think your defensive capabilities will stay with you as part of your legacy?

Pippen: I think it will stay at the top, really. When I look at my career, that's really what I was about, defending. I was a guy that had a lot of tools and could do a lot of other things, but my main thing was really controlling the defensive end of the court, really sort of captaining my teammates and communicating. Those are the things that made me not only just a great individual defender but a great team defender as well.

ESPN.com: Who did you enjoy defending the most? And who did you find it most difficult to defend?

Pippen: Oh, early in my career, Dominique Wilkins. He was probably my most difficult player out on the perimeter. But being a young, skinny kid coming into the league, there were a lot of guys who would take advantage of me down on the block, Adrian Dantley, Mark Aguirre. But as far as out on the perimeter, guys like Dominique Wilkins, Alex English, Larry Bird, those guys, it took a lot of studying of tape to really get to the next level, because they were so much more advanced than me.

ESPN.com: Looking back at your rookie year just to see who was on the roster that year, I noticed you played in the league with Artis Gilmore. What are some of the defining memories you have of not only your rookie season, but also of being drafted and getting traded for Olden Polynice?

Pippen: Just really coming to a great situation in Chicago, one of the best teams in the league. They were definitely on the rise, and having Michael in his third or fourth year in the league gave me an opportunity to really build something special with one of the greatest players to ever play the game.

ESPN.com: A lot of people consider you the prototype for the type of player that teams are looking for today: long, athletic, able to play on offense both outside and inside, but then also on defense. Have you heard that a lot? And do you think maybe you were a prototype for the way NBA people have wanted their players to look?

Pippen: I feel that I was. Obviously, I did a lot more than most guys that play the small-forward position in today's game. I was more of a four, I ran the offense, but I also did the defensive work. I guarded, most of the time, the toughest [opponent]. I was able to play two or three positions and I think that's a huge advantage. You've got a lot of teams now, like Dallas with Nowitzki, he's a guy that with his offensive ability, he's a three. But the ability he has to shoot the ball as well as put it on the floor and get to the basket, that's allowed him to play the four position and put teams at a disadvantage.

ESPN.com: People who followed the Bulls during the '90s championship years had a better appreciation of what you brought. People who were fans of the Knicks or the Lakers, they're quick to say of Scottie Pippen, "Hey, Scottie was a sidekick. He's best-appreciated as Michael Jordan's sidekick." Now, sidekick is, I don't want to say a loaded word, and I wouldn't exactly say it's derogatory, it's somewhere in the middle. How do you feel about the word sidekick and having that be part of how you were defined?

Pippen: Well, I mean it's fine, as far as I know what I accomplished as a player. I really can't control what anyone thinks of me as a player. I know what I did throughout my career. My numbers and my stats and my accolades speak for [themselves], so I can't really control what anyone thinks of me as a player. I know what I was as a player. People around the game, that know the game, they understand.

ESPN.com: If you had to do it all over again, would you have liked to have had a career in which you didn't play next to the player considered the greatest player of all time?

Pippen: No, I don't have a problem with it. To be successful, it takes two. And I feel it was a very unique situation to play with the greatest player to ever play the game. Why would I ever want to change that?

ESPN.com: When the end was coming for the Bulls in '97-98, everybody around the team kind of knew that was the last run. ... Do you think there's anything that could have ever been done [to keep that team] together? And if so, what would it have taken?

Pippen: I think it could have definitely been kept together, but it would have taken a lot of money. We had a lot of free agents at that time, five or six free agents -- myself, Michael, Steve Kerr, Luc Longley, a lot of guys that were free -- and it would have been very difficult to keep us together. The organization sort of saw it that way as well, that it would have taken a lot of money to keep a lot of the free agents they had. You know, everyone was thinking that we were getting old. Things of that nature were starting to creep up. You know, they think that they did the best thing.

ESPN.com: When you look at the six championship years, and even [all the] years you were with the Bulls, a lot of playoff games, and you won most of them ... what was the most gratifying victory out of any of those championship years, or even the non-championship years?

Pippen: I think the '91 Eastern Conference finals against the Detroit Pistons was probably the most gratifying. We had been through struggles with some of the great teams in the era -- Boston, the Pistons and the Milwaukee Bucks. And to finally be able to say we had gotten over the hump gave ourselves an opportunity to win the championship, and we beat probably the best team out there in the Eastern Conference finals.

ESPN.com: And as far as championships go, was '91 also the most gratifying because it was the first, or was maybe the last one a little tougher?

Pippen: I think the first one was, definitely, because we didn't really get any passage as far as being advanced. I mean, every series that we played in was very tough. We felt like we played against the best teams out there, and we beat the Pistons and then we had to face the Lakers, so we knew we were facing the two top teams, so there wasn't any other route for us to go, but we ended up going through the best.

ESPN.com: The two years that Michael was away playing baseball, there was the time you wore the red sneakers in Minneapolis at the All-Star Game, and you were the All-Star MVP. To me, I remember that as you being at your absolute peak. Would you say in those two years you were at your physical and talent peak?

Pippen: Yeah, I thought I was. Every night I sort of got the call. I knew I had to be ready, that this was my team and it was on my shoulders. At the end of the day, this team could only go as far as I was able to carry them. So I could definitely say that those were probably two of my better seasons, and the fact that I didn't have anyone to sort of share the spotlight with. I knew that it was my team.

ESPN.com: What about disappointing postseason losses? Would '94 -- losing to the Knicks in the semifinals -- be the most disappointing one with the Bulls? Or would it be something pre-'91?

Pippen: I would think it was probably 1990, playing the Pistons in Game 7 and I had a migraine headache in that final game. So that was probably the most disappointing because I felt like we were ready that season. We had pushed them to the limit, but unfortunately I was unable to perform in the seventh game.

ESPN.com: The migraine you mentioned. The two things your detractors are always going to point out are the migraine, and the 1.8 seconds. How much regret is still left over, from the 1.8 more so than the migraine?

Pippen: Well, there's always a little bit of regret. But things happen in life, different situations, and that was just a learning situation for me. From the migraine to sitting out the 1.8, I learned to be better about taking care of my body and preparing myself to be a professional every day.

ESPN.com: Is it unfair for people to use those two instances when defining your career?

Pippen: No, I don't think it's unfair. I mean, if that's the worst that you can find, I feel like I did pretty good.

ESPN.com: Let's move on to Houston and Portland. Talking to Jermaine O'Neal in Indianapolis, he said he remembered how when Scottie first got there he wasn't playing at the time. But Jermaine was saying how he was busting up Rasheed in practice, and how Scottie was one of the guys out there going public, saying 'We should use this guy, this guy has got an enormous amount of talent.' What do you remember about being with Jermaine, and about when he was coming into the league and when he was 18, 19?

Pippen: Well, when I saw him as a young player -- I think I played against him a couple years before I joined him as a teammate -- and I'm going to be honest, I didn't think much of his game because he never really got to play. Then when I first arrived in Portland, he was a very energized kid and he worked very hard. He showed that he wanted to play. But obviously there were some problems with the coaches and the organization, that they didn't think that it was his time yet. You know, I thought our first season we had a very successful season. We ended up losing to the Lakers in the Western Conference finals in a Game 7 that we really couldn't continue in the fourth quarter. You know, they busted that team up. And I was really disappointed and hurt by the fact that they had busted the team up and let Jermaine go like that. I mean, he was the future -- for me as well as for the Portland Trail Blazers. This guy was as dominant as any player in the game during our practices. And I have much respect for the way he came to work every day and he laid it all out on the line. He wasn't going to play, and practice was his game situation. He really dominated. And once we traded him, he started showing that he's a dominant player in this game.

ESPN.com: How much of a carryover do you think that Game 7 had on the way that franchise headed over the next five years?

Pippen: Oh, it had a huge carryover. They busted the team up, and really, it took the whole franchise down. They still haven't recovered from it yet. You lost two of your good cornerstone players in Brian Grant and Jermaine O'Neal; at that time, two guys probably capable more on other teams of being stars, but they accepted their roles to come off the bench and be contributors and practice hard, do all the little things that keep your team cohesive and together. Once we lost those two players, it really sent us down.

ESPN.com: What about personally, that Game 7 loss? It came in the end part of your career, and the Lakers took you guys out in sweeps the next two years. So that was really the last time you got close to the finals. Does that one sit with you and burn you up? Or is that one, since it wasn't with the Bulls, is it on a kind of a different plane?

Pippen: I really liked Portland a lot, and that one really sticks out a lot because it would have given me an opportunity to win a championship after leaving Chicago. That's the closest I ever got.

ESPN.com: We haven't touched on Houston. It only lasted a year, and it was a short 50-game season. What happened there, and why did it turn so bad so quickly? You had said after that season that you didn't feel Charles Barkley was committed enough to win a championship. A lot of people at the Rockets felt that sort of came out of the blue at the time. Was that something that had been building over the course of that season?

Pippen: Well, I think it was just something that really sort of came out of frustration. I had not enjoyed my stay in Houston for the short time I was there, and I had the opportunity to move on, and that's what I did. I think I did the right thing when I look back at it.

ESPN.com: When your number does go up, it's hard to imagine now what it's going to feel like now, but could you have ever imagined being a player who would have his jersey retired? And how do you want people in Chicago to remember you?

Pippen: As a player, you always dream that one day you'll be great enough to see your numbers go up to the rafters. Obviously, I'm following behind some other great players. But that's your No. 1 goal. That's what I've always wanted, as a young player, that's what I worked for, strived for, and I was able to achieve. Fortunately the fans in Chicago, they really appreciate me, and what we'd bring as a team in my 11 years there. It's the greatest city in the world. It's the best place to play, by virtue of comparison.

ESPN.com: You had sort of a mild-mannered, different persona than Michael. Quieter and not as flashy of a game, never got as much credit. Did that serve you well, or was that a disservice to you?

Pippen: I think it served me well. You can't miss anything that you never had. So, I didn't go to University of North Carolina. I didn't have the media chasing me my whole career as a collegiate player. So, things of that nature never really bothered me because I've never focused on them.

ESPN.com: On Phil Jackson, Red Auerbach a couple weeks ago took a mild swipe at Phil by saying he picked his spots. What's your opinion on how much credit Phil Jackson should get for those six titles? Could any coach have won those six titles with those teams that he had?

Pippen: Well, first of all, I think we all pick our spots. No one wants to step into a bad situation, and I think Phil has done a great job at doing that. But I can't say that he exactly picked his spot in Chicago. It was a spot that he landed in, and he was able to be very successful in it. I can't say anyone could. Doug would've, but he didn't. He took the greatest player in the game from taking 35-40 shots a game and got him to buy into his offensive system, got him believing in his teammates. I mean, I don't see a lot of coaches that can do a lot of the things that Phil has done from a coaching standpoint. Take a look at the Los Angeles Lakers, Shaq and Kobe. How many years were they together before Phil showed up? There was no success there. You know, picking your places is good, and you've got to pick the right places, but you've also got to be able to perform when you get there. I think Phil has been able to do that wherever he's been.

ESPN.com: What about with this year's Lakers? Is there too much going on there for Phil to be able to use his same formula to get that team back to that level again?

Pippen: I still see him using the same formula. I think Phil's formula of really using five players on the basketball court, utilizing that triangle offense, is something that is going to be very successful in this game for a long time. He has Tex Winter, his mentor, doing all the teaching day in and day out, and it's just a very special situation to be in, to really have the experience to really understand it. Look back at Kobe, he's the one guy that's young enough that he's having an opportunity to relive the best time of his career, with Phil Jackson. You don't get that no more, that you can go back and grab hold of something that was good for him. It's worked out good for him, and I think it's going to be something that he can move forward in his career and appreciate.

ESPN.com: Who's the next Scottie Pippen, as far as guys in the league now?

Pippen: I think there's a lot of good, young talented players. If you want to say (Lamar) Odom, you can throw him out there, but I do believe it's going to take him a little more time to adjust to Phil's offensive system, but he will continue to get better. You've got Tracy McGrady, and there's a lot of young players out there that have the potential. It's the fact that you want to see them get in the gym, put the work in, then show up come postseason.

ESPN.com: Can Lamar become a lock-down defender?

Pippen: I think he can, if he keeps working at it. He has the size, he has the speed, he has the ability and he has the will. And that's the most important thing: if you're willing to put forth the effort to play defense, then it's no harder than the offense.

3) Mike Kahn of FOXSports.com thinks that Shortsgate is ridiculous:

NBA should stop worrying about shorts

Call this theme: Dress code, Part II, unless you prefer the parlance of the past 30 years — Shortsgate. How naive to believe that the dress code issue had been put to rest once the players got used to actually wearing adult clothes. Yes, the NBA has every right to tell the players what they should wear when representing their teams and the league in public. Whether it's traveling to and from games, attending events or simply sitting on the bench when injured or inactive, that is the prerogative of their employer to lay down the law on appearance. The caveat, of course, for the league's disdain for the hip-hop style some players prefer is that the league stop marketing to hip-hop fans. If they're going to be hypocritical, then don't turn up your nose to players dressing that way when it's obviously part of their own personalities. But that's a different story — although still lingering in the wind. This time, it's clearly an even more ludicrous turn of events when a dozen players get fined $10,000 apiece when their "team-issued" shorts are deemed too long by the NBA uniform police. Excuse me, $10,000 for shorts that are one-tenth of an inch too long? Denver Nuggets forward Carmelo Anthony drills a ball into the stands out of frustration, and it just happens to hit a young woman in the face. He gets fined $5,000. Let's see, $10,000 for shorts too long; $5,000 for hitting a fan in the face with a thrown ball out of frustration. And then the teams got fined $50,000 over their players' shorts? Gee, that's proportionate, isn't it? No wonder, the NBA Players Association filed a grievance Wednesday on behalf of the Dirty Dozen. Following suit, so to speak, it begs the question why the Players Association and executive director Billy Hunter agreed to such a silly rule in the new collective bargaining agreement anyway. It's one thing to embarrass the league wearing a throwback jersey, jeans sliding down their hips, a sideways baseball cap and 30 pounds of jewelry to an NBA semi-formal charitable function. It's quite something else to have shorts a bit too long. In case you haven't noticed, everybody wears long shorts these days. Been to the gym lately? Watched any old basketball films lately? Now those shorts are embarrassing. Do you think if Larry Bird and John Stockton were in college today they'd be wearing short shorts? Heck, they'd probably be fined for wearing shorts too short! We're not talking about women's culottes or skirts for crying out loud. We're talking about basketball shorts. Big ones. You know, the way basketball players have been wearing them for more than a dozen years now.
If they were hanging down to their ankles and falling off with the straps from their jocks showing like thongs; that would be a different story. Perhaps it's just a coincidence, but of the 12 players getting slapped with these exorbitant fines — Denver's Voshon Lenard, DerMarr Johnson and Andre Miller; Indiana's Jermaine O'Neal, Stephen Jackson and Jamaal Tinsley; Philadelphia's Allen Iverson, Kyle Korver and Kevin Ollie; New York's Nate Robinson and Stephon Marbury; and Jeff McInnis from the New Jersey Nets — O'Neal is the only big man. Is it possible the shorts are just longer on the shorter players? Logic screams there should be some wiggle room with the length of shorts. Meanwhile, it's becoming this out of control dictatorship. It's almost as if Dick Cheney is calling the shots here. It brings to mind Iverson's notorious "practice" press conference, since all we're talking about here is basketball. The lack of proportion hit a completely new level in a different sector of the new CBA just this week when Seattle's Reggie Evans, scheduled for a random drug test before the Sonics game with the New York Knicks, forgot. And since he didn't know how long it required to complete the entire drug test — including paperwork — he agreed to do it at halftime. Only it didn't take 15 minutes. The coaching staff didn't even know where he was and by the time Evans finished everything, the second half was well underway. A starter, Evans didn't get back into the game until less than two minutes remained in the quarter. The Sonics squandered a big lead in the process and lost the game. That's not to say the faux pas lost the game, but it did change their rotation, and that's not even the point. Why would that happen? Fortunately, the league has admitted to the error and no longer can drugs tests be administered during a game (brilliant decision). Rules are necessary to maintain some semblance of order and respect. Indeed, the players make big money to perform at the highest level, and they represent their organizations, their cities and the NBA. But the way things have gone so far this season, the league office should focus less time policing the minutiae and get a better handle on common sense. For there to be any news at all this week regarding Shortsgate and random drug testing only detracts from the product they're so desperately trying to protect.

4) Steve Bulpett of the Boston Herald looks back to look forward:

A look behind has us ahead
There is the perception out there that the NBA has gone to Hades in a handbasket, what with all the tattoos and cornrows and gangsta rap and (fill in your racially tinged buzz words here). But when it was noted on these pages recently that Marvin Barnes claims to have done cocaine on the Celtics bench during the 1978-79 season - and when Cedric Maxwell and other players from the era talked about the league’s generally crazy lifestyle of the time - it got some to thinking that today’s players are getting a bad, well, rap. “Guys are more famous now, and there’s more media covering them,” Danny Ainge said. “So maybe anything bad that happens gets picked up quicker and talked about more. But let’s be honest about this. Players today work harder, eat better and take better care of themselves than they did when I played. I mean, we have guys who work harder than anybody I played with - including Larry Bird. Larry was a great worker, but there are some guys today who work harder and take better care of themselves.” Celtics coach Doc Rivers believes the NBA’s current image problems have been exacerbated by those on the airwaves. Personally I think radio talk shows are why people view our league like that,” he said. “I mean, I think our players have a little to do with it, but overall we have a very good league. “It’s nothing like when I first came in, when it was a drug-infested, bad-attitude, no-defense-playing league. These guys work hard now. Ninety-eight percent of the guys in this league are good kids, but the two percent dominate the talk shows. “Years ago it was much worse, but the things that happened didn’t get as much publicity. It was bad. I mean, it was really bad. Especially my first two years. It cleaned up quick, if you remember, but it was bad for a while. “The worst thing I saw was Chris Washburn falling asleep on the bench in Game 7 - the Larry Bird-Dominique Wilkins shootout (in May of 1988). Chris was falling asleep. Obviously it had to be from something. There’s a lot of bad stories I won’t get into, but there was some bad stuff. There were some crazy things I saw, especially in my first year. It was unreal.” Looking back on his playing days, Ainge said, “When I was in baseball I saw amphetamine use, but I never saw anything in basketball. I heard things, but I never saw anything.” Considering his religious beliefs and lifestyle, that’s not much of a surprise. Ainge wasn’t exactly the type to be hanging around nightclubs. “I was going back to my room and eating cheeseburgers and ice cream to abuse my body,” he said with a laugh. There was a tie between the modern-day Celtics and the late ’70s version. You might recall the Celts got out of the two years remaining on Barnes contract, and the case is one the club studied when it was trying to sever its ties with Vin Baker. The difference that allowed the C’s to settle with Barnes by paying him just the remainder of his ’78-79 salary is that Barnes began missing practices and games. Baker showed up, albeit in improper condition to perform to his potential. According to Jan Volk, then the Celtics’ general counsel and later their general manager, the team took the most direct route to solve the problem. It didn’t deal with the issue of illegal substances. “There were problems that were consistent with drug use,” Volk said of Barnes, “but that’s not what we focused on. There was no drug policy in the NBA at the time, and we just dealt with the fact that Marvin wasn’t making himself available to us for practices and games. We terminated for cause. “There was the suspicion of drug use, but while Red (Auerbach) may watch ‘Hawaii Five-O’ and ‘Magnum P.I.,’ we weren’t playing those roles. It was much simpler than that for us. We knew the rumors, but we didn’t have anything substantive - and we didn’t need anything substantive to do what needed to be done for the team.” [continue] Volk was disturbed to hear of Barnes’ claim of cocaine use while in uniform, but he is more saddened by the lost greatness. “It’s a tragedy that there were personal circumstances - in retrospect, beyond his control - that limited his ability to reach his potential,” Volk said. “But I feel bad for Marvin as a person, too. I’m happy that he seems to have gotten his life together now because I’ve always had a high regard for him as a person. When we won the championship in 1981, one of the first people I heard from was Marvin with a congratulations. He was never not a gentleman. He was never difficult to deal with. He just wasn’t performing, and now we understand the reasons.”