- Howard Beck of The New York Times: "The Knicks surely earned their catcalls in a 118-114 overtime loss to the Sacramento Kings on Tuesday. Even after a string of calamities this season -- a 50-point rout by Dallas, a 9-point loss to the hapless Nets -- this defeat was among the most humiliating. The Kings arrived with the fourth-worst record in the N.B.A. and had lost 13 of their last 14 games. So the Knicks had reasonable expectations for a victory, before losing a 15-point lead in the final eight minutes of regulation. Afterward, Coach Mike D’Antoni referred to a broken spirit. But the Knicks’ most glaring weakness is the one no one ever cites: a simple lack of talent. On any given night, indeed on most nights, the best player on the court belongs to the opponent."
- Dan Bickley of The Arizona Republic: "Amar'e Stoudemire gets your blood racing. He's a beast, a hammer, a half-player, a head case. He is the final nightmare for General Manager Steve Kerr, whose stewardship of the Suns likely will end this summer, punctuated by this impending decision. 'I love the guy,' Kerr said. 'He has a great heart.' Right. What? Look, this is confusing stuff. The Suns can't afford to keep Stoudemire, and they can't win a playoff series in 2010 without him. With the team surging again, another give-away trade would be lethal, inciting fan mutiny and permanently staining the reputations of Kerr and owner Robert Sarver. Kerr is in the final year of his contract and there has been little movement on new negotiations. The Stoudemire situation is flammable and fluid, and hard positions are foolhardy. Except for this: If the Suns can't get a first-round draft pick and complementary piece in return, they should swallow hard, shut down trade talks and keep Stoudemire for the rest of the season, even if it means allowing him to walk away at the end of his deal."
- Chris Dempsey of The Denver Post: "J.R. Smith isn't going anywhere at the NBA trade deadline, and here's the kicker: He shouldn't. The Nuggets are better off with him. Seriously. The Lakers are on every fan's mind, and with good reason. They're the defending champions. But if the Nuggets are fortunate enough to make it back to the Western Conference finals and face them, it's time to rethink the matchup. You can change what you do to match the opposition. That's one way of attacking a problem. But the Nuggets don't need to do that. They don't need to change to match the Lakers as much they need the Lakers to match them. Smith is the matchup problem. He obviously can be a devastating shooter, has improved his dribble-drive into the lane and finishing at the rim over the last couple of seasons. And though there are still some bad turnovers and bad shots, I've told anyone who has asked that I believe overall he's played a much better floor game this season than last. He is, in fact, an improved player."
- Ira Winderman of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel: "Michael Beasley has taken the next step in his NBA journey. He now has to deal with trade rumors while pushing through a season. About 20 minutes before the Miami Heat arrived for Wednesday's game against the Atlanta Hawks at Philips Arena, Beasley was informed of a latest round of speculation linked to Phoenix Suns forward Amare Stoudemire, a round that included him as a potential part of a deal. 'I don't pay attention to the talk,' he said. Until now, there was little reason to, beyond some trade speculation around last June's draft. This time, though, Stoudemire's status as a potential impending 2010 free agent adds credibility to permutations involving the Heat. 'Amare is a great player,' Beasley said. 'He's proven himself so far in this league. Just to be mentioned in the same sentence with him means something.' Asked if, less than two seasons into his NBA career, such discussions would indicate the Heat was giving up on the No. 2 overall pick in the 2008 NBA Draft, the former Kansas State standout said, 'only if you want to look at it that way. I don't want to look at it that way.' "
- George Diaz of the Orlando Sentinel: "Dwight Howard gets the superstar status and the McDonald's commercial breaks with LeBron James and Larry Bird. Vince Carter is the guy who is supposed to super-size this franchise into an NBA champion. You're they guy, not Howard, who gets the ball in the closing minutes of a tight game. You're the guy who must shake his label as an extremely talented player who isn't the consummate team guy. You're the guy who is supposed to take this franchise to the next progressive step. We all know where that leads: An NBA title. I'm not a poker guy, but it's obvious that the Magic went all-in when they signed Carter and ignored any pretense of rolling with Hedo Turkoglu again. Been there, done that, and all it got them was a sniff of what it's like to win an NBA title. They Magic didn't like that much, especially after the champagne started popping in the Lakers' locker room at Amway Arena. So say what you will about Howard, Jameer Nelson, Rashard Lewis,or anybody else. Most of the chips are on Carter's side of the table. The Magic anointed him The Guy."
- Jason Quick of The Oregonian: "The final boxscore from the Trail Blazers’ stunning 108-101 victory at Phoenix on Wednesday says that Blazers veteran Juwan Howard had 10 points, 5 rebounds and 0 assists. Little did the official scorer realize, Howard also deserved one very big assist. See, the roots of this victory - the first in the last 10 games here - were planted by Howard the night before, shortly after the Blazers were humbled 89-77 by Oklahoma City in the Rose Garden. Behind the Blazers locker room door, before the coaching staff entered, Howard went on a tirade in front of his teammates. He cursed. He yelled. And he demolished a huge tub that players soak their feet in after games. 'It was shocking,’ rookie Dante Cunningham said. 'It was, ‘WHOA! HO!’ I mean, there was water and ice flying everywhere. It was like, ‘OK, maybe we really did something wrong.’ We all sat back and thought about it. I think it got everybody’s attention.’ according to the Blazers players, that attention -- and that tension -- held throughout the team’s flight to Phoenix. And when McMillan assembled the team for a morning viewing of the Oklahoma City game, every player was intent on learning from what Howard called 'the horror film.' "
- Jamie Samuelsen for the Detroit Free Press: "We live in a 'what have you done for me lately' society, which gets a tad absurd. It’s a society in which people tell me that Peyton Manning is a choker, Chris Osgood can’t get it done and Curtis Granderson is too obsessed with charity work. I’m not putting on the blinders and suggesting that Joe Dumars will have the Pistons raising the trophy again in a couple of years. I’m just saying that he deserves the opportunity to try. ... If Dumars were fired, he’d be hired by another team in about four seconds. Do you think Colts fans want to dump Manning? Did Tiger fans (other than a writer here in town) want to dump Granderson? I know you all want to dump Osgood, but you’re wrong. So why dump Dumars? I just don’t get it."
- Eddie Sefko of The Dallas Morning News: "Take a look at the players who are playing Sunday in the All-Star Game and there are tangible ways you can see their age without looking at their date of birth. Some of them, you can count the rings on their fingers to calculate the years. For others, you'd need to cut them open to find any rings, which would be as plentiful as any giant redwood tree. Either way, in the NBA, old is in. Steve Nash turned 36 last week. He looks older than that, battle scars mounting every time he takes another smack to the mouth resulting in more blood and stitches. But he was voted in as a starter for the All-Star Game at Cowboys Stadium. Tim Duncan is 33 and continues to anchor the Spurs, whose consistency for more than a decade embodies that of their tireless leader. Dirk Nowitzki is in his 12th season and is 31 years old. Kevin Garnett seems like he's been around since Jerry West was in his prime. He's 33 and has missed considerable time of late with injuries but remains the heart and soul of the Celtics. For the most part, these guys don't need a walker to get around on the court. They have maintained remarkable health and staying power to pile up more All-Star appearances than anybody could count."
- Benjamin Hochman of The Denver Post: "For someone as eccentric as the shot-blocking, mattress-hawking, mustache-rocking Christopher 'Birdman' Andersen, it is understood he perpetually lets his hair down. In the past three games, he's literally done that, dropping his spectacularly spiked faux-hawk. And, complemented by his sprouting blond 'stache, Bird looks like, well, Larry Bird. And coincidentally, he's playing much better, with three of his best games this season in the past week -- against the Lakers, Jazz and Mavericks, to boot. 'He looks shorter for sure,' Chauncey Billups said of the 6-foot-10 Andersen's new look. 'Whatever it is, I hope he keeps it, because he's really playing Birdman basketball. When he's getting offensive rebounds, blocks and flying all over the place, and he's the hardest-working, most-energized guy on the floor -- we're really hard to beat. When he's not, when he's kind of regular, teams kind of take advantage of us and him and his position. But when he plays how he's played the past three games, that's the Birdman we know; that's the Birdman everyone fell in love with last year.' When asked about his new look, all Andersen would say Wednesday after practice was, 'I ran out of gel.' His smile after answering gives hints the spike might be back."
- Mary Schmitt Boyer of The Plain Dealer: "Zydrunas Ilgauskas made his debut as a puppet in the James-Kobe Bryant Nike commercials on Tuesday night. His character enters a barber shop where the discussion centers on the Cavs' many and varied pre-game routines. 'I'm big time now,' he said with a grin after practice on Wednesday. 'Now I've made it. My kids loved it. I thought it was funny.' Of course, James noted that Ilgauskas went 1-for-10 in Tuesday night's victory over New Jersey, the night the commercial debuted. 'I told Z that he has to handle the pressure of having a commercial and playing the same day,' James said. 'He gets a commercial and then he goes 1-for-10. He didn't handle the pressure of being a superstar so I might have to take him out of it.' "
- Jeff Rabjohns of The Indianapolis Star: "PETA hopes to help draw attention to the plight of birds by appealing to another bird. Larry Bird, that is. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals sent a letter on Wednesday to the Indiana Pacers president, asking him to stop endorsing McDonald's. PETA claims that in McDonald's U.S. operations, 'chickens still have their throats cut while they are conscious and many are scalded to death in defeathering tanks,' while McDonald's European operations render chickens unconscious before they are processed. 'With the nagging back problems that plagued him throughout his career, Bird is the first person who should sympathize with the millions of chickens who are killed for McDonald's -- chickens whose wings, legs and backs are routinely broken,' PETA director Dan Shannon, who describes himself as a lifetime Boston Celtics fan, said in a release."
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