Can't believe it's already startin' http://www.nba.com/2009/news/features/art_garcia/10/01/refs/index.html
I view this Thuggets/Jizz matchup the same way I view an NFC East battle among the Cowboys, Iggles and G'ints--Body Bag Game!
I wonder if any of those games are going to be on TV. I could use some hoops tonight, even if it is pre-season.
http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/boxscore?gid=2009100126&refresh=30 Nene' with the first bucket of the year bitches! Let it begin!!!!!!!!
As they prepare to open the preseason tonight against Denver, the Jazz are facing the prospect of spending $94.2 million to bring back 12 players from last season's team that finished with a 48-34 record and eighth in the Western Conference. The Jazz hardly fit the bill of a typical luxury-tax team, as they play in the league's sixth-smallest market and are not among its top tier of championship contenders, but circumstances have dictated otherwise this season. Once Carlos Boozer, Mehmet Okur and Kyle Korver each decided in late June to play the final year of their contracts rather than opt for free agency, the Jazz effectively were saddled with a luxury-tax payroll. The pain only was exacerbated when Portland signed Paul Millsap to a four-year, $32 million offer sheet that the Jazz decided to match. The Jazz prepared for every contingency, O'Connor said, but that didn't make things easier. "We didn't have a whole lot of options," O'Connor said. "We had one decision to make and that was on Paul." As he talked through the various scenarios with the Millers, O'Connor said the main argument was keeping young players valuable to the franchise's future at the expense of a season of financial pain. "We had talked for a long time that this was a possibility," O'Connor said, "but it could be a one-year possibility." http://www.sltrib.com/sports/ci_13457104?source=rss
