- Mike Bianchi of the Orlando Sentinel: "Now that the Magic beat the Cleveland Cavaliers 99-89 in Game 3 Sunday night at the amped-up Am maybe somebody will turn down the volume on this limitless LeBron LeLovefest. It's like listening to Barry Manilow singing 'Mandy.' It's like listening to Stevie Wonder singing 'I Just Called to Say I Love You.' It's like listening to Paul McCartney singing 'Silly Love Songs.' Barf. Yes, LeBron's a great player. Yes, he hit a great shot Friday night in Game 2. But from listening to all the hoopla, you'd think it was the greatest shot since William Tell split the apple sitting atop his son's head. ... When asked if he wanted to comment on the imperceptible fouls on LeBron, Magic coach Stan Van Gundy replied with a snarky smile, 'No, but you can. You write a column. The league won't fine you $25,000. You guys see it. Write what you saw.' Give Van Gundy and the Magic credit. They are the only ones in the league who refuse to be LeBron's LeBootlicker."
- Brian Windhorst of The Plain Dealer: "History says the team that wins Game 3 in a tied series ends up winning the whole thing most of the time. But that statistic wasn't needed Sunday night. The naked eye is enough to tell the direction the Eastern Conference Finals appear to be going. The Orlando Magic just seem to make the Cavaliers look like the underdog, their top-seed status and history-making regular season simply notwithstanding. The Magic outplayed the Cavs again in Game 3, winning, 99-89, to take a 2-1 series edge. The Cavs now need three wins in the next four games to reach The Finals. The Magic seem better equipped. ... Unlike during the regular season and first two rounds of the playoffs when his teammates constantly rose to his aid, it is not happening against the Magic. Mo Williams, Delonte West and on Sunday Zydrunas Ilgauskas just aren't delivering. With much less margin for error, the recipe isn't working."
- Brian Windhorst of The Plain Dealer: "Mo Williams made plenty of mistakes Sunday night and then he came into the media room and made it worse. His comments following the Cavs Game 3 loss wouldn't have been all that smart had the Cavs been ahead in the series and he was playing well. Then they would have come off as arrogant. Instead they came off as rather stupid. 'I think we're giving guys too much respect personally. They are a good basketball team but so are we.' Mo said. He meant that the Cavs are altering their defense and their game too much to deal with the Magic. Even if that is true, it came off very poorly for a guy shooting 32 percent in this series. The words 'too much respec' probably should be left out of sentences when you're down in a series."
- Andrea Adelson of the Orlando Sentinel: "Cavs guard Mo Williams called the elbow to the face he took from Anthony Johnson a cheap shot, but refused to use it as an excuse for another poor shooting night. ... He needed four stitches to close cuts above and below his left eye, and was briefly taken to the locker room for treatment. When asked whether the hit was a cheap shot, Williams replied, 'Most definitely.' 'That was the second time -- you can recall the play when I dove out of bounds last game he gave me an elbow then,' Williams said. Williams said he has no previous history with Johnson, a reserve guard for the Magic. 'I've got bigger fish to fry,' Williams said. 'I've got to figure out how to make some shots. I could care less about Anthony Johnson. He plays 12 minutes a game, I could care less.'"
- Mark Heisler of the Los Angeles Times: "La Vida Fisher. Knowing how loco this subculture is, as Derek Fisher does, it's still a mind-bender to find yourself written off one moment, and a hero the next ... for saying a few words to your teammates before the fourth quarter of Game 3, when they turned the Western Conference finals around. You've heard of King Leonidas and his 300 Spartans? Meet Fish and his 11 Lakers. Fisher's plea, before they came from eight points down against the Denver Nuggets to win Game 3, is now known as his 'This is what it's about' speech, and ranks with, 'If your arrows blot out the sun, we will fight in the shade!' Not that Fisher expected it, after saying what he said spontaneously, because it's what he does. Imagine his surprise when teammates called it a rallying cry, and people began asking what his motivation was, if he writes his own stuff, and what makes him so inspirational, even if he hasn't hit the broad side of a barn in a while. 'If I knew what it was,' said Fisher, laughing, 'I'd put it on QVC for like $29.99.' Of course, speeches deemed inspirational after the latest victory are often forgotten after the next loss."
- Chris Dempsey of The Denver Post: "If the Nuggets end up losing the Western Conference finals, the enduring images will be of two botched inbounds plays that, in effect, sealed Denver losses in Games 1 and 3. Inbounding the basketball seems simple enough. Right? Not necessarily. 'It's a whole process,' Nuggets guard Chauncey Billups said. 'First of all, there's got to be good screens set. Second of all, as an inbounder you have to have two or three options that you're going to go to. You've got to know who's defending -- if they are fast or strong or long or like to get in passing lanes. And then you have to worry about the man on the ball, if he's active, if he's trying to stop you from getting the ball where you want. And you have five seconds.' Denver's problem in Game 3 was miscommunication. Kenyon Martin's pass to Carmelo Anthony was based on the assumption Anthony was fading toward the midcourt line to get the ball. Instead, Anthony curled and Martin's pass was off-target."
- Bob Young of The Arizona Republic: "The NBA is going to have to come up with a replacement for that marketing slogan of theirs 'The NBA: Where Amazing Happens' and its playoffs cousin 'Where Will Amazing Happen This Year.' Thing is, the NBA playoffs blew right through 'Amazing' in that first-round series between the defending NBA champion Boston Celtics and the Chicago Bulls, a seven-game series that featured two overtime games, a double-overtime game and a triple-overtime game. Somewhere along the way, the postseason became 'Where Ridiculous Happens.' "
- Geoff Calkins of Memphis Commercial-Appeal: "Owner Michael Heisley -- who thought about flying to Madrid with Chris Wallace and Lionel Hollins -- dismissed reports that he prefers UConn's Hasheem Thabeet to Rubio. And he said that if the Grizzlies decide Rubio is the guy, they'll take him no matter what his agent says. 'We're going to take the best player,' he said. 'Everybody in the league should know that by now.' Which is one time it's good to have a stubborn owner, isn't it? Back in Memphis, Barone Jr. flipped off the big sc
reen. 'What do you think?' he said, trying to be dispassionate again. I think it's Rubio or bust." - Bob Ford of The Philadelphia Inquirer: "The only surprising part of the 76ers' exhaustive and exhausting search for a head coach is that there hasn't been a single surprise yet, least of all that Jay Wright would prefer the cozy nest of Villanova to the dodging of freeway traffic that comes with coaching in the NBA. General manager Ed Stefanski said he was performing 'due diligence,' which is sports executive speak for 'I'm taking my time because if I mess this up nobody gets out alive, including me.' There is really no clock ticking, unless Eddie Jordan is the guy Stefanski really wants and the Sacramento Kings, also searching for a coach, feel the same way. The Kings were a lot more attractive before falling out of the top draft spot in the lottery, and, on balance, the Sixers are a better opportunity, if that tells you anything. If Stefanski has a silent agreement with Jordan to sit tight until he completes the ritual of courtesy and information-gathering interviews, that might explain why nothing has happened yet. Or it might be that Jordan is not the guy. Either way, Stefanski isn't saying much, and there is no track record of his management style to judge which way he's going to jump."
- Gordon Monson of The Salt Lake Tribune: "Evaluating Kevin O'Connor's decisions could be done thusly: He's cautious. He's orchestrated a lot of moves that haven't made much of a difference. And he's made a few that have profoundly affected the franchise. He's alternately thrown away money and squeezed nickels. He's drafted poorly and smartly. Now, with the Jazz on the brink of significant transition, with their respected longtime owner gone, with opt-outs and free agents springing loose, with a need for a competitive boost against a conference growing stronger with talented, young teams, with the Jazz's cap crunched, O'Connor will have to be at his best, he'll have to be right this summer, he'll have to step up and take risks. He cannot shrink away. If he does, if he embraces the status quo or fumbles and bumbles around, and the record shows it could go either way, he'll do more than lose games and ground against the West. He'll lose credibility with the people who matter most: his customers, his team's fans."
- Dan Bickley of The Arizona Republic: "The Suns are expecting to lose more than 20 percent of season-ticket renewals. They are hoping to finish with a 70 percent renewal rate, and that will take some effort. The playoffs have proven again that this is a stars' league. It is not by coincidence that LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Carmelo Anthony and Dwight Howard have their teams in the conference finals. So who is that player in Phoenix? Amaré Stoudemire is recovering from a serious eye injury and has a history of bad knees. His contract expires after next season. Who do you sign? Who do you keep? Steve Nash says he wants a happier team full of purposeful athletes. But is there truly a trade market for Shaquille O'Neal? These are heavy questions, and fans remain skeptical."
- Ray Ratto of the San Francisco Chronicle: "Warriors media relations director Raymond Ridder crossed that line, no matter what his intentions might have been, and he made the organization, already known for its hypersensitivity to facts and criticism, look even more so. But to focus on Ridder is to miss the bigger picture, and that is this: The Warriors are in a position of extraordinary weakness here and not only don't see it, they are putting their hands over their ears and singing loudly to drown out the noise. The economy is bad. Their results are bad. Their word-of-mouth is bad. Their chief officers are easy to caricature and lampoon because they live the caricatures so proudly. Even their method of customer relations, the conference call with season-ticket holders, misreads the audience because it puts up yet another wall between them and their last line of loyal adherents. They should be showing up everywhere for anyone who will have them all summer long, not doing a one-off over the phone."
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