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What is Pau Gasol worth?

Many believe this is the central question of the Lakers' offseason.

Gasol was integral to three straight Finals appearances. He out-fought and outplayed Dwight Howard and Kevin Garnett in back-to-back Finals victories. But careers and perceptions change quickly in L.A. and, to many, it now appears imminent that Gasol and the remaining $38 million on his contract will be traded this offseason.

Three top Lakers writers break down Gasol's place in the Lakers' future:

• OC Register’s Kevin Ding (who noted Gasol had a plus/minus of minus-53 for the second round): "It's abundantly clear now that the triangle offense is long gone that Lakers can use some perimeter pizzazz and tenacity a lot more than they can use Gasol's versatility-turned-uncertainty. But even if Gasol averages 50 points and 30 rebounds in the Olympics, the Lakers have a further complication in that they are trying to reduce their payroll in the wake of the post-lockout luxury-tax penalties and revenue sharing that have changed their landscape. Because of that, trading Gasol for a great player who has another massive contract isn't what they really want, either. The Lakers might have to go that route and figure out some money things later, as they were willing to do with their aborted deal for Chris Paul before the season."
• ESPN LA’s Dave McMenamin: "Bryant publicly demoted Gasol to the third scoring option during the regular season and then called him out in the playoffs for not being the aggressive scorer he once was. That makes Gasol the first to go. Call up Houston. Call up Chicago. Call up Minnesota. Call up Orlando. See whether interest is still out there. Better yet, call up all 29 other teams and maybe even go the draft pick route. This year's draft is widely considered to be the deepest in nearly a decade. Gasol turns 32 in July. He's played 11 years in the league plus put in a ton of time overseas playing for the Spanish national team. He averaged 12.5 points per game during the playoffs. History will show he was a vital piece of the Lakers' championship lore, but now is not the time for nostalgia. He's the first domino."
• ESPN LA’s Brian Kamenetzky: "He's supremely talented, versatile and a true team player capable of elevating any good team to elite status, and perhaps of pushing a near-elite team over the top. On the other hand, he won't transform a Brooklyn-esque loser, is very expensive, on the downside of his career, and short of being sent to a team in Spain, won't energize a season-ticket base. Finding a new home for Gasol isn't a simple proposition. The same contract prompting the Lakers to move him will make many teams hesitant to take him on."

The analysis above agrees that Pau is: expensive, talented, seven years older than Andrew Bynum and perhaps not the best fit, emotionally, with Kobe Bryant (though that seemed to be working just fine a few years ago).

The Lakers need more depth and fewer gargantuan contracts, so all signals point to Gasol's departure. Indeed, the Lakers have signaled that they are ready to part with him and, though the transaction was canceled by the NBA, the thwarted three-way deal that would have brought Chris Paul to the Lakers still provides the most accurate measure of Gasol's value.

Back in December 2011, the Rockets were willing to give up Kevin Martin, Luis Scola and Goran Dragic in exchange for Gasol.

That’s quite a haul, and a similar trade this summer would supply the Lakers, who counted on Steve Blake and Devin Ebanks for important rotation minutes in the playoffs, with real punch off the pine.

But after a disappointing postseason, does Gasol net the same goodies?

It’s true 2012 was Gasol’s worst scoring season of his NBA career by a point, though his rebounding and assist numbers remained constant. And it’s true that Gasol played farther from the basket on offense than at any time in his career.

It’s also true -- and this is important -- that Pau Gasol is a center. The Lakers managed to end up with two excellent 7-foot players, so Gasol, the more versatile one, plays power forward, but he’s a center. And it’s hard to overvalue a center who rebounds, defends, scores and passes like Gasol. The fact that the Lakers have surplus of this kind of player is borderline obscene and the reason many thought they could contend this season despite their obvious flaws.

They have options.

Perhaps Bynum would draw a better return.

Or maybe instead of ditching Gasol or Bynum, the Lakers could, like the San Antonio Spurs, simply extract more value from their cheaper pieces. After all, the combined salary of Kawhi Leonard, Gary Neal and Danny Green is less than the Lakers pay Steve Blake.

But it won’t be possible for them to get anywhere near the salary cap with their big three -- or even their two bigs -- on the books.

See, here’s the real issue for the Lakers, the one that makes moving Gasol or Bynum seem inevitable: Kobe Bryant’s spectacularly huge contract.

Last offseason, Henry Abbott first noted what an albatross this contract would become:

"Bryant is due to draw a salary of $25,244,493 in 2011-2012, $27,849,149 the following year and $30,453,805 in 2013-2014, when he will be 35. The cold hard question for general manager Mitch Kupchak would become: Which Laker team is better, Bryant and $32 million or so in supporting cast, or $60 million in the best players money can buy without Bryant?

...it may be time to find out if Bryant might consider waiving his no-trade clause. He is such a big name that he may, even under a new CBA, fetch the Lakers a player or two in addition to salary cap relief.

Then there's the final, unthinkable option: It has been discussed that the new CBA may have an amnesty clause, that lets teams buy out players and send them on their way. Depending how it's negotiated, this could include salary cap relief. And if so, would the Lakers use it on Bryant?”

Whether or not they knew league-wide austerity measures were in the offing in 2010, when they gave Bryant his last big extension, there’s no debate that, in basketball terms, the Lakers drastically overvalued their star wing. He is now a volume scorer who is still an excellent player, but the fact is that players better than him -- like Dwight Howard, LeBron James, Kevin Durant and Chris Paul -- are paid way less. Even supposing that, despite his age, Bryant's game somehow remains at its current level, the market price for a superstar has fallen precipitously since his last contract.

By the time Kobe's current contract nears expiration, it will be one of the worst in the NBA -- not because he will have deteriorated beyond recognition, but because the outrageous sum will have such a limiting effect on the Lakers' options.

So perhaps instead of wondering what Pau is worth, we should be asking different questions:

Is it worth $30 million in 2014-15 to see Bryant retire a Laker?

To many, the answer is an emphatic “Yes!”

But what about on the court -- is he worth more than Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili combined?

Because that’s how much he makes.

Is he worth destroying the most formidable frontline in the NBA?

Because, as everyone seems to tacitly acknowledge, that’s how much Kobe Bryant costs.

It will likely be argued that Stan Van Gundy is a product of his star players. After all, he has only coached teams that included either Dwyane Wade or Dwight Howard. And Howard especially anchored a defensive unit that, in the Van Gundy era, has certainly been one of the best in the league.

For four straight seasons, the Magic ranked in the top five in defensive efficiency -- including first in 2008-09 and second the following season.

Over the five season span that Van Gundy coached the team, the Magic ranked second-best in the league in defensive efficiency, second in defensive field goal percentage and first in points in the paint allowed.

All because of Dwight Howard, you say? Consider that in Howard's three seasons before Van Gundy became head coach, the team ranked 15th, 11th and seventh in those categories.

That could be a product of Howard simply coming into his own and developing into a dominant force as an NBA player. But though Howard reportedly wanted the coach out of town, Van Gundy leaves with several impressive items on his coaching resume.

He reached the playoffs in all five seasons with the Magic and racked up 31 playoff wins. That's more playoff wins than the franchise had in its previous 18 seasons of existence.

Since Van Gundy took over, he led the Magic to a better regular-season record than all but three teams. The only franchsies who were better are the Los Angeles Lakers, Boston Celtics and San Antonio Spurs.

He's not likely to get mentioned in the same breath as Phil Jackson when discussing the greatest NBA coaches, but there is something big that Stan Van Gundy and Jackson have in common: neither coached a losing season.

Jackson coached 20 seasons and never had a losing record, while Van Gundy's total was just eight seasons. Five with the Magic, three with the Heat. And yes, that includes the year with the Heat where Van Gundy was 11-10 before being replaced with Pat Riley.

But Elias tells us that Van Gundy is in rare company. Along with Jackson, the only others who coached at least eight seasons and never had a losing record are former Knicks coach Joe Lapchick and former 76ers coach Billy Cunningham. Both are in the Hall of Fame.

And Van Gundy's .641 career winning percentage puts him in another elevated group: coaches with a winning percentage that high who have coached at least 500 games. Counting Van Gundy, that group is only six members and includes Jackson, Gregg Popovich and Red Auerbach.

But since the 2009 NBA Finals appearance, Van Gundy's Magic teams just haven't had similar success. They had 13 playoff wins that year, beating LeBron James' Cleveland Cavaliers, the Celtics and the Philadelphia 76ers on their way to the Finals.

Since then, they've tallied just two series wins and been bounced by the Atlanta Hawks and Indiana Pacers in consecutive years.

On a night when four teams could have ended their first-round playoff series, only the Indiana Pacers claimed a spot in the Conference Semifinals.

After losing the series opener, the Pacers dominated the series against the Orlando Magic. In the clinching game, they outscored Orlando 18-0 in fast-break opportunities and 46-22 in the paint. For the series, they held a 69-13 advantage in fast-break points and outscored the Magic by 76 points in the paint.

Darren Collison dished out 23 assists and committed just one turnover during the series. Since individual turnovers were first tracked by Elias in 1978, he is only the fourth player with 20 or more assists and one or fewer turnovers in a playoff game. The others were John Paxson (1990 Bulls), Fat Lever (1988 Nuggets) and Eddie Johnson (1987 Sonics).

Dwight Howard's injury doomed the Magic before the series started. Including the playoffs, Orlando finished 5-12 without their starting center and 33-21 with him in the lineup. This was the fifth time in the last 20 years that a team was missing its leading regular-season scorer in the playoffs – all five teams lost in the first round.

The Boston Celtics had a chance to eliminate the Atlanta Hawks, a team against which they had won nine of 10 previous playoff series. According to Elias, that .900 series winning percentage is the highest for any team against another in NBA history (with a minimum of six series played).

This was the 12th time under Doc Rivers that the Celtics had a chance to close out a series on the road; they have only succeeded twice. They return to the comforts of TD Garden on Thursday, where they are 7-3 under Rivers in potential close out games.

The key for the Hawks on Tuesday was Al Horford. In the 41 minutes that he was on the court, the Hawks outscored the Celtics by 10 points and grabbed eight more rebounds. While he rested, they were outscored by nine.

With a chance to finish their series against the Chicago Bulls, the Philadelphia 76ers couldn’t even match their nickname in the point column. Philadelphia was held under 70 points in a playoff game for the second time since the shot clock was introduced in the 1954-55 season. The franchise low was 68 points against the Magic in the 1999 playoffs.

With the win, the Bulls avoided becoming the first No. 1 seed since the playoffs were expanded to 16 teams in 1984 to win fewer than two games in the playoffs. The four previous top seeds to lose in the first round all won two games before they were eliminated.

The Los Angeles Lakers were looking to win their ninth-straight potential series-clinching game, but lost at home to the Denver Nuggets. It was their first loss in a potential close out game since Game 6 of the 2009 Western Conference semifinals against the Houston Rockets. According to Elias, that was the fourth-longest such streak in NBA playoff history. The Lakers also own the longest, 12 straight from June 2000 to May 2004.

Kobe Bryant scored 43 points in the loss, the 84th time in his career that he reached 30 points in a playoff game. The only player with more was Michael Jordan, with 109. It was the 12th time that he reached 40 in the playoffs and first since the 2010 Western Conference finals.

The NBA Playoffs get underway this weekend with four games each day. The marquee matchup in the Eastern Conference, featuring the Miami Heat and New York Knicks, starts on Saturday (ABC, 3:30 ET).

The Heat are in the postseason for the fourth consecutive year and have made the playoffs in eight of the last nine seasons. The Knicks are making back-to-back playoff appearances for the first time since appearing 14 straight times from 1988 to 2001.

Miami is the No. 2 seed for the second straight year and the sixth time in franchise history. The last two times that they were second in the East, the Heat made it to the NBA Finals.

The Knicks were swept in the first round in each of their last two playoff appearances. Their 10-game playoff losing streak is the longest active streak in the NBA and the longest in franchise history. New York’s last playoff win was on April 29, 2001, against the Toronto Raptors.

Despite having a great season and finishing with the fourth-best record in the NBA, the Heat weren’t the same team after the All-Star break. Miami was dominant in the first half of the season, but scored 11 fewer points per game the rest of the way.

After Mike D’Antoni resigned on March 14, the Knicks rallied to finish 18-6 under Mike Woodson. According to Elias, only two teams made a coaching change after the All-Star break and then won a playoff series.

Both previous instances involved Don Nelson getting the boot. The 1995-96 Knicks and 2004-05 Dallas Mavericks each went on to win a playoff series after parting ways with Nelson.

Fast-break Points
• Since the playoffs expanded to 16 teams in 1984, No. 4 and No. 5 seeds are dead even in the first round. Each has won 132 of 264 games and 28 of 56 series.

• Fourteen of the 16 teams that made the NBA playoffs last year are back this year. This year, the Los Angeles Clippers and Utah Jazz replace the New Orleans Hornets and Portland Trail Blazers. According to Elias, this ties the NBA record for most returning teams, set in 1986 and matched in 2001 and 2003.

• The Memphis Grizzlies are in the playoffs for the second straight season. Last season, Memphis became the fourth No. 8 seed to knock off a No. 1 seed. Not only was that the Grizzlies first playoff series win, but the first playoff games won by the franchise.

• The San Antonio Spurs are in the playoffs for the 15th consecutive season, the longest active streak in the NBA. The Spurs are the top seed in the West for the second straight season, but lost in the first round last year.

• The defending champion Mavericks are in the playoffs for the 12th straight season, the second-longest active streak in the NBA.

• The Philadelphia 76ers have lost five consecutive postseason series, tied with the Milwaukee Bucks for the second-longest active streak in the NBA (Portland has lost seven straight series).

• The Orlando Magic will be without leading scorer Dwight Howard after he underwent back surgery. The last five teams that were missing their leading scorer in the playoffs were eliminated in the first round.

Ernest Tolden contributed to this post

Nobody wants to be hated. (Well, unless you’re Ozzie Guillen.)

So when one player’s decision to sign with another team leads to scores of jerseys being used as kindling, deep-throated boos raining down with every touch of the ball and NBA legends taking turns on the punching bag to emphasize their back-in-my-day ideals, others take notice.

"I think Dwight had a lot to [think about]," said Kevin Love on the latest superstar decision to engulf the league, one that managed to supersede most NBA trade deadline and NCAA madness this week. "When he was thinking about it, I'm sure he was thinking that he didn't want to lose any popularity. I don't think LeBron should've lost any popularity for it, but he did.

“Some guys are looking at that now because of what he went through. Obviously, it was on a grander scale, because [LeBron’s] an MVP, probably the MVP this year so far, so I’m sure that probably played into it with Dwight.”

Earlier this year, Love got a small taste of the kind of pressure Dwight Howard endured before making his pre-trade deadline decision to opt-in with the Magic. With restricted free agency awaiting if he didn’t extend his deal before the Jan. 25 deadline for players under rookie contracts, therefore complicating any type of escape plan he may have wanted to hatch, the stakes weren’t nearly as high. Still, it was a big move for Love, who ultimately inked an extension before the buzzer to stick around in Minnesota with Rick, Ricky and the gang for four more seasons.

But with an opt-out clause available in the fourth year of his new deal, the heat will certainly be turned up in the summer of 2015, when the bigger markets will surely beckon for the media-savvy Love.

After seeing the attention that accompanied every flip and flop in the Howard saga, months removed from the Chris Paul saga, a year removed from the Carmelo Anthony saga, and a year and a half after the 2010 free-agent bonanza, making up his mind beforehand may pay off in the end.

Not in the literal sense, mind you. The dollar sign-adorned sacks will always be there for a player of Love’s caliber. But for increasingly image-conscious star athletes, whose “brands” may be as important as the brand of ball their teams play, a public relations nightmare like the one LeBron James endured last season (and still feels tremors of today) may make a few star players think twice about their choices. Especially when it comes to thinking about ditching a small-city team for the bright lights of a bigger market.

It seems to have already affected Howard, who took the opposite approach of LeBron in his post-decision news conference by making sure to point out how devoted he is to his team … even though, at this point, he only remains tethered to them until next summer, with no telling what may happen thereafter.

"I'm glad this is finally over," said Howard at a news conference on Thursday, playing loose with his idea of finality. "... It's not as easy as some people think. It's been very hard. We're talking a career-changing event. Most people don't see that.

"I'm very loyal and I've always put loyalty above anything."

Loyalty is a funny thing, though. (Hilarious even, if you’re Dwyane Wade.)

Steve Nash, now in his eighth season in his second stint in Phoenix, is hailed for sticking it out with a Suns team caught somewhere in between a rebuild and playoff contention, to the point where some say the 38-year-old deserves to go wherever he wants. Yet James, a free agent at the time of his decision, was lambasted for leaving Cleveland, despite the fact that he had given seven good years (and two conference finals) with a supporting cast that was nearly as ill-conceived as the current-day Suns.

The only difference is how you perceive them.

But that perception can make all the difference.

As he noted on Thursday, this one decision is going to change Howard’s whole career. Not only in terms of where he played, who he played with and how his team performed. Dwight Howard, the person, will forever be shaped in our minds by how he chose to handle this situation this past week, and by whatever he and the Magic choose to do next year, when, barring some postseason breakthrough this spring, both sides will likely find themselves in a familiar predicament.

If he stays put, Howard will likely be saluted for his loyalty and likely pigeonholed as the anti-LeBron, like Kevin Durant and Derrick Rose before him.

If he goes, Howard will likely be greeted with groans and labeled as selfish, just like LeBron.

Howard isn’t just choosing a career path so much as he is choosing who he wants to be in the public eye. For a guy who obviously cares about his career away from the court, such a decision is a scary one. (LeBron's image is still recovering.)

And it’s downright frightening when you consider that Howard, despite a body crafted in a Mattel factory, is human. It’s easy to assume that athletes, who handle hostile crowds routinely, can overcome a little fan hatred; some may even feed off it, or at the very least use it for motivational Twitter fodder. But the ability to jump higher or run faster doesn’t prevent even the most elite physical specimen from feeling the weight of a country’s worth of scorn.

James himself seemed to have been shaken by it, saying before the season that he no longer wanted to play the villain role, and more recently discussing the possibility of returning to play for Cleveland someday. And when faced with what may have been a similar burden, Howard hit delay rather than realize the consequences.

Despite all the progress James seemed to make by shucking the unwritten laws of major sports free agency and taking some of the power back to the players’ side, the intense backlash that resulted threatens to undercut it.

“Nobody wants to be hated,” Howard said on Thursday.

Not even a superman.

Justin Verrier is an NBA editor for ESPN.com. Follow him on Twitter.

Chicago Bulls
PG Derrick Rose  SG Ronnie Brewer  SF Luol Deng  PF Carlos Boozer  C Joakim Noah
Minutes Played: 284
Offensive Rating: 111.6 points per 100 possessions
Defensive Rating: 91.8 points per 100 possessions

How it works offensively
In 2010-11, the Bulls were a middling offensive team that relied on one dominant mode of attack -- a dynamic Rose at the top of the floor. This season, Rose is still the prized asset in the Bulls' scheme, but he's orchestrating a deliberate, savvy offense that's expanded its breadth.

This unit plays at a plodding pace of 90.9 (which would rank them last in the NBA), but it's a tight, killing-you-slowly kind of assault. How many teams pressure you with a point guard like Rose, who collapses the defense anytime he works off the dribble, but can also feed the post and have three quality options from there? When you watch these Bulls move around the court with purpose, it's hard not to see hints of the best of the Deron Williams-Boozer era in Utah -- only better, because Noah's screens and ball skills are so exceptional for a big man.

This group also features two world-class athletes in Deng and Brewer who understand how to play off a penetrator, as well as a couple of big guys who know how to hit a cutter. Ever since Derrick Rose arrived on the scene in Chicago, we've been hearing about how the Bulls have a fatal hole at shooting guard. Bulls fans, you have your shooting guard. His name is Ronnie Brewer.

The rap on Brewer has always been that he can't space the floor. Fair enough, because Brewer is a subpar shooter from beyond 10 feet. But elite teams find workarounds for flawed players, and the Bulls have maximized Brewer's many strengths beautifully. Spacing is a nice attribute to have in an offense, but movement is woefully underrated in today's game. And you won't find a lot of players who move more intently off the ball than Brewer. He might not hit a shot for you from 24 feet, but he never stops moving. Feed, clear, cut and repeat.

Would there be more space for Rose to work if he had a couple of wings who were better conventional shooters than Brewer and Deng? Possibly, but there are more ways to bludgeon an opponent than a drive-and-kick. Putting bodies in motion and forcing opponents into bad decisions with endless actions has its virtues.

How it works defensively
The vaunted Tom Thibodeau defense is no longer an exotic mystery cooked up in some lab in Cambridge, Mass. It's simply standard operating procedure for several NBA defenses -- but few, if any, of the imitators run it with the precision this unit does.

On nearly every half-court possession, the Bulls' defense has one objective -- keep the ball out of the middle of the floor. Once they have you confined to the sideline and you try to, for example, run a pick-and-roll, the Bulls will strangle you like a python by trapping, then bringing a third defender to the ball side of the paint to add further pressure.

What makes this unit particularly deadly when they implement this defense? Let's start with Joakim Noah. Bringing three guys to the ball is all well and good, but it doesn't help if you don't have two defenders who can cover the rest of the floor in what's essentially a two-man zone. There isn't a big man who performs this task better than Noah. He instinctively knows where the offensive threat is coming from -- when the ball will be reversed out of that pressure, to whom it will go to and how to best help without compromising the system.

Throw in two lanky defenders like Brewer and Deng, whose length, agility and smarts allow them to both stifle defenders on the ball or work as Noah's partner in that backside zone, and you have the components for the most difficult defense to score against in the NBA.

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Orlando Magic
PG Jameer Nelson  SG J.J. Redick  SF Hedo Turkoglu  PF Ryan Anderson  C Dwight Howard
Minutes Played: 178
Offensive Rating: 118.3 points per 100 possessions
Defensive Rating: 98.4 points per 100 possessions

How it works offensively
How good has this group been with the ball? There isn't a five-man unit that's recorded a higher offensive rating or a larger point differential in its favor. This isn't Orlando's most-used unit -- that would be the starters with Jason Richardson at shooting guard instead of Redick (402 minutes on the floor versus 178). The starting five aren't chopped liver, but the Redick-at-the-2 unit blows them away.

In many respects, this unit evokes the halcyon days of the Magic, circa 2009. Stan Van Gundy is one of the great pragmatists in the league. He deftly appraises his personnel on the floor and always seems to find a way to maximize those players' strengths while minimizing their weaknesses. These are familiar schemes that leverage Howard's presence down low to open up the perimeter for the Magic's snipers along the perimeter -- specifically Redick and Anderson.

Many times it starts with a high pick-and-roll with Nelson and Howard. The Magic get penetration or a deep feed to Howard in the paint, which forces the defense to collapse. When that happens, you know the drill -- a kickout to Redick or to a lifted Anderson for a clean look at a 3-pointer. Nelson has also developed a nice pick-and-pop rhythm with Anderson to find him open shots.

Other times, they initiate offense through Turkoglu on the left side. Turkoglu's efficiency numbers have fallen off since 2009 (he's shooting poorly and turning the ball over too frequently), but he's still capable of putting the ball on the floor and finding shots for others, and getting Howard the ball where he likes it. Redick is in constant motion in the Magic's half-court sets, breezing around baseline screens, getting free via pin-downs and using his escape dribble along the perimeter to find space.

And that's how an NBA unit chalks up a gaudy true shooting percentage of 60.5 percent, even with a below-average free throw rate.

How it works defensively
This unit earns its money on the offensive end -- a 98.4 defensive rating isn't anything to be ashamed of, but doesn't qualify as elite. Still, these five are getting a sufficient number of stops.

Unlike their contemporaries up in Chicago, Orlando places more of a premium on chasing shooters off the 3-point line, and they have the luxury of staying at home because they have a very large man with very broad shoulders manning the basket area and cleaning up any blow-bys that might occur. How is that going? Opponents are shooting 24 percent from beyond the arc against this unit and converting only 4.8 3-pointers per game. That is what chopped liver tastes like.

As imposing as Howard is under the basket, altering shots and intimidating, his pick-and-roll defense is also a key ingredient to this unit's defensive success. The Magic don't need to rotate all that often and, when they do, Howard recovers promptly to the back line and those rotators can immediately dash back to the perimeter where they can contest long shots with a close out, or just stagnate the offense.

One-on-one defense can occasionally be problematic, but Redick's tenacity -- both on-the-ball and chasing rabbits like Ray Allen around screens -- is vastly underrated. Turkoglu is no Tony Allen, but his length and awareness of where Howard is lurking makes him an adequate defender, as well. Finally, Nelson is a sturdy fireplug who can use his strength to bother opposing point guards, though he does yield his share of blow-bys.

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Miami Heat
PG Mario Chalmers  SG Dwyane Wade  SF LeBron James  PF Chris Bosh  C Joel Anthony
Minutes Played: 389
Offensive Rating: 109.9 points per 100 possessions
Defensive Rating: 94.7 points per 100 possessions

How it works offensively
This past summer, Erik Spoelstra immersed himself in a single exercise: Examine how he could make life easier for the Heat's offense by diversifying their attack. In 2010-11, Spoelstra grappled with several strategies -- elements of the Rick Adelman's corner offense, "elbow sets" run through Bosh with multiple triggers and even some old Hubie Brown sets to free up shooters. The Heat finished the season as the NBA's third-ranked offense.

Spoelstra came to a realization, one that didn't necessarily conform to his natural instincts: The Heat could do better, and to achieve that improvement, it would require less conventional structure. He has freed up James and Wade, made transition opportunities and early offense priorities (Miami has gone from 21st in pace last season to 12th this season) and found new ways to space the floor.

So far as Wade and James, they have one imperative -- catch the ball and attack and don't allow the defense to set. No more dawdling at the top of the floor, waiting for stuff that never materializes. Off that, the Heat have found gold with Chalmers' vastly improved outside shot. The Heat were assembled with the idea that James and Wade would have quality shooters primed for kickouts, and with Chalmers, they have a teammate shooting 44.3 percent from 3-point-land.

Fewer sets are being run through Bosh at the high post with this unit, though he's still able to facilitate when the pace settles into a more deliberate, half-court game. Many of those sets that started with Bosh at the high post are now being initiated with James at the "Karl Malone" spot off the mid-post. Meanwhile, Bosh and Anthony screen with the best of them -- especially to lend space for Wade to attack -- and Bosh is still superb at lifting to a spot 18 feet away from the hoop for a no-dribble J.

How it works defensively
Spoelstra is still experimenting and tinkering with the Heat's schemes. Many a night, Miami is flirting with a Thibodeau-style strongside strategy, but one with a bit less structure and more freedom for James and Wade to rove. This isn't coming without costs: This unit is giving up 19.2 3-point attempts per 48 minutes, and opponents are shooting 40.4 percent from beyond the arc in the process.

The Heat are aware of the shortcoming and seem willing to tolerate a few gimmes on the perimeter in service of their larger defensive goal -- create chaos. That means more ball pressure than ever from Chalmers, and Bosh and Anthony jumping out with impunity on every ball screen. When it comes to defending the pick-and-roll, Bosh and Anthony might be the best big man tandem in the business at showing hard and recovering to the right spot on the back line.

Most of all, Spoelstra is encouraging James and Wade to operate as free safeties in what can be described as a quasi-two-man zone. Spoelstra's nature favors order over chaos and he traditionally has discouraged gambling, but he's come to appreciate that doubling-down on his team's athleticism makes good sense.

The results are there. Opponents are turning the ball 16.8 times per 48 minutes against this group. More impressive, the unit generates 23.3 points per 48 minutes off these turnovers and 22.5 fast-break points per 48 minutes. There simply isn't a defense in the world that can stop James and Wade in the open floor and the Heat's newfound guerrilla defense has maximized these opportunities.

The rebounds have always come in bunches for Minnesota Timberwolves forward Kevin

Love

Love.The 3-pointers seem to come in streaks.

Love had 39 points and 17 rebounds in the Timberwolves win over the Los Angeles Clippers in a game in which he netted an impressive statistical accomplishment.

Via the Elias Sports Bureau, Love is the first player in NBA history to record consecutive games of at least 35 points and 10 rebounds, making at least five 3-pointers in each game.

Love went 1-for-7 on 3-pointers in his first two games after winning the NBA’s three-point shooting contest. That capped a month in which he went just 8-for-41 on 3-pointers, but he is 10-for-18 from long distance in his last two, with five apiece against the Trail Blazers and Clippers.

Thunder reign on off-night
How good are the Oklahoma City Thunder? Good enough to beat the Dallas Mavericks on a night in which Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant shoot 12-for-38 from the field.

The Thunder had their second-worst shooting night of the season, but improved to 3-0 in 2011-12 when shooting under 40 percent from the field.

Teams shooting below 40 percent from the field entered Monday with a 46-195 record in games this season (.191 winning percentage).

Howard’s Magic Touch
Dwight Howard was 16-for-20 from the field in the Orlando Magic’s 92-88 win over the Toronto Raptors.
It was the ninth time in his career that Howard took at least 15 shots from the field and made at least 80 percent of them. That’s the second-most such games among active players, trailing only Amar’e Stoudemire, who has 11.

Howard's free-throw struggles (4-for-14) cost him a chance at a 40-point, 80-percent shooting game. He's the last player to have such a game, doing so a year ago against the Oklahoma City Thunder.

Instead, he became the first player to shoot at least 80 percent from the field and below 30 percent from the free throw line since he did so in March, 2010. The only other player with multiple such games games in the last 20 years is Shaquille O'Neal.

Howard did handle himself alright on the defensive end, holding his man to 2-for-8 shooting, based on Synergy’s video review data.

Team Feat of the Night
The Chicago Bulls outrebounded the Indiana Pacers, 60-32, in Monday’s win. The plus-28 rebounding margin was the biggest by any NBA team against an opponent this season, and the biggest by the Bulls in a game since late in the 1996-97 season when Michael Jordan and company outrebounded the Philadelphia 76ers, 66-32, for their 66th win of the season.

Plus-Minus Note of the Night
Philadelphia 76ers rookie center Nikola Vucevic posted a career-worst -21 in a loss to the Milwaukee Bucks.

The 76ers got burned by Bucks center Drew Gooden, who finished with 25 points and 10 rebounds, his fifth 20-10 game this season, and Brandon Jennings (33 points), who is averaging 31.3 points in three games this month.

The New Orleans Hornets figured out how to thwart the best efforts of New York Knicks guard Jeremy Lin.

Lin matched the NBA’s season high for turnovers with nine, eight coming in the first half of Friday night’s loss.

Lin did finish with 26 points, but they didn’t come as easily as on some other nights.

Lin entered shooting 61 percent from inside five feet this season, netting about 10 points-per-game on those shots. He was just 2-for-8 on those opportunities in this contest.

The two field goals were his fewest from in-close in this eight-game run, in which the Knicks are now 7-1.

Lin has fared as well in the pick-and-roll in his last four games as he did in the first four games of this spurt. He shot 62 percent with 13 turnovers on pick-and-roll plays in the first four wins of the seven-game win streak, but is just 8-for-30 with 19 turnovers since then.

Lin now has 45 turnovers in his seven starts, the most by any player (via the Elias Sports Bureau) in the first seven starts of his career since the 1976-77 season (the first season after the NBA/ABA merger).

Heat turn tables on road

The Miami Heat finished off their six-game road trip by blowing out the Cleveland Cavaliers. Miami went 5-1 on its road trip, and its half-court offense was significantly better on this road trip than its last one.

The chart on the right shows the difference between the two. In the first go around, a five-game trip, the Heat were outscored by 45 points in half court.

They outscored opponents by 80 points in half court in these six games.

Look who’s a winner
The Hornets weren’t the only team with limited success this season to win on Friday.

The Charlotte Bobcats won on owner Michael Jordan’s 49th birthday, snapping a 16-game losing streak.

The Bobcats got their first win since January 14. To put that into perspective: On that date, Jeremy Lin had 30,000 Twitter followers. He now has more than 400,000.

Statistical Feat of the Night
Dwight Howard had his seventh 20-point, 20-rebound game this season in the Orlando Magic’s win against the Milwaukee Bucks. No other player in the NBA has more than two such games.

Howard has the fourth-most 20/20 games of any player since the NBA and ABA merged. Via the Elias Sports Bureau, his 39 are two shy of Charles Barkley for third-most and three shy of Hakeem Olajuwon for second-most.

Moses Malone has the most since then, with 109.

Plus-Minus Note of the Night

The only player to have a bad night for the Heat was Udonis Haslem. In his 21 minutes against the Cavaliers, the Heat were outscored by 15 points. In the game’s other 27 minutes, the Heat outscored the Cavaliers by 39.

The -15 was a season-worst for Haslem, who entered +42 in his previous four games.

Dwight Howard became the first NBA player this season to record a double-double in the first quarter on the way to finishing with 25 points and 24 rebounds as the Orlando Magic beat the Miami Heat.

It was the sixth 20-20 game of the season for Howard. No other player in the league has more than two such games, and the rest of the league has combined to only match Howard’s total. That’s not a unique position for Howard; during the 2008-09 season, he had nine 20-20 games while the rest of the league combined for eight.

Howard doesn’t often shoot from behind the arc, but he did attempt his fifth 3-pointer of the season on Wednesday. He wasn’t the only Magic player to go long-range in the game. Orlando attempted a franchise-record 42 3-pointers. The Magic were the fifth team since the 1996-97 season to attempt more shots from 3-point range than inside the arc in a single game.

Stop the Lin-sanity
Jeremy Lin continues to take New York by storm. In his second NBA start, Lin scored 23 points and dished out 10 assists to finish with his first career double-double to lead the New York Knicks pas the Washington Wizards.

Lin is the first player since LeBron James in 2003 to score at least 20 points and hand out at least 8 assists in his first two NBA starts. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, only five players have done it since the merger. Greg Anthony (1991-92), Negele Knight (1990-91) and Billy McKinney (1978-79) were the other three.

Even before he moved into the starting lineup, the Knicks offense had been much better with Lin on the court than sitting on the bench. New York scores nearly 12 more points per 48 minutes with Lin on the court, with most of the difference coming due to getting open shots in the paint.

Statistical Feats of the Night
The Houston Rockets bench outscored the starters 66-37 in the team’s win at the Portland Trail Blazers. The 66 bench points tied for second-most in the NBA this season, behind the 68 scored by the Dallas Mavericks against the Sacramento Kings on Jan. 14.

Tony Parker was 12-for-24 from the field and 13-for-13 from the free-throw line against the Philadelphia 76ers. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, the last Spurs starting guard to make at least half his field-goal attempts and convert all his free throws in a game (minimum: 10 made FG and FT) was George Gervin during the 1983-84 season.

Dirk Nowitzki scored 25 points, his third straight game with at least 24 points after only topping that mark twice in his first 19 games this season. Nowitzki moved past Adrian Dantley into 21st on the NBA’s all-time scoring list.

Plus-Minus Note of the Night
All 10 starters for the Rockets and Trail Blazers finished the game with a negative plus-minus. All five Rockets bench players finished in positive territory. Chase Budinger, who scored a game-high 22 points, recorded a game-high plus-15. Jamal Crawford, who led the Blazers with 21 points off the bench, was the only Portland player to avoid a minus, finishing at plus-8.

The Orlando Magic have lost five of their last six games, and their offensive woes include point totals of 56, 67 and 69 in three of those losses.

What has gone wrong for the Magic offensively? Let’s take a closer look at two aspects of their game using our video review tools, ones similar to those used by NBA teams.

Inside Game
Orlando's offense has missed opportunities inside during the six-game stretch, shooting 49 percent from inside five feet.

This is something the Magic did very well last season. They made nearly 64 percent of their attempts from inside five feet, which ranked fifth in the NBA. They were hovering around 60 percent for this season prior to this slump.

This is something that has been an issue for Ryan Anderson, Glen Davis and even Dwight Howard. Anderson and Davis are making barely 50 percent of their shots from this close, putting them near the bottom of the league rankings.

Howard, who ranked sixth in the league last season making 72 percent of his shots from inside five feet, has hit just 60 percent this season.

Pick-and-Roll
The Magic are averaging more than 19 turnovers in their last six games, compared to 14.0 turnovers in their first 15 games. They also have gone cold on three-point attempts. Orlando's gone from shooting 40 percent from long range in their first 15 games to making around one-third of its attempts in this 1-5 stretch.

There is a connection between this ineffectiveness and the issues with the Orlando pick-and-roll offense, something on which the Magic rely heavily.

The performance difference can be seen in the chart on the right.

The Magic have run the seventh-most pick-and-roll plays this season (which includes shots resulting from passes off a pick-and-roll).

Orlando is shooting just 32 percent on three-point attempts off of pick-and-roll plays over the last six games, compared with 41 percent in its first 15. But the Magic now are committing turnovers on these plays nearly twice as often, not giving themselves the best chance to score.

Tonight the Magic host the Washington Wizards, who don't rate well at forcing turnovers on pick-and-roll plays (only one team generates them less often when defending the ballhandler), so the Magic should be able to get their shots off those plays. If those shots don't fall against a 4-17 opponent at home, it's a sign of just how far the Magic have fallen this season.

KNICKS MAKE IT A NICKEL
The Milwaukee Bucks beat the New York Knicks who have now lost five straight games and stand at 6-9. Although Carmelo Anthony scored 35 points in the loss, the Knicks now stand at just 20-21 since trading for him last February.

A trend of leaning on Anthony in isolation continued against Milwaukee, as Anthony accounted for 15 of the Knicks’ 19 plays in isolation. On the season, the Knicks have ran a higher percentage of isolation plays than any other team, but are shooting just 29.3 percent on such plays, the worst in the NBA.

Brandon Jennings scored a season-high 36 points in the win, but did so without attempting a single free throw. He is the first player to score at least that many points without attempting a free throw since Jason Richardson in January 2008. Two of the three highest scoring games of his career have now come at Madison Square Garden, having hung 37 on March 25 of last season.

HOWARD SHOULDERS THE LOAD
Dwight Howard had 21 points and 23 rebounds to lead the Orlando Magic over the Los Angeles Lakers 92-80. It was Howard’s fifth game with at least 20 points and 20 rebounds this season, more than the rest of the NBA combined. According to Elias, Howard is the first player since Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in 1975-76 with at least 20 points and 20 rebounds in five of his team’s first 15 games of the season.

Although Kobe Bryant scored 30 points, the Lakers offense continues to struggle as they failed to top 100 points for the 10th straight game. That is tied for the second-longest such streak by the Lakers in the shot-clock era (since 1954-55).

BULLS WIN WITHOUT ROSE
Despite playing without Derrick Rose, the Chicago Bulls won 114-75, handing the Cleveland Cavaliers their worst home loss in franchise history. According to Elias, the 39-point margin of victory is the second-largest ever by the Bulls over the Cavaliers, trailing only a 121-80 result on December 22, 1970.

Chicago held Cleveland to just 30.3 percent shooting, the fifth-lowest allowed in a game this season. It was the fifth time this season the Bulls have held their opponent to under 35 percent shooting. The Lakers are the only other team with even three such games this season.

AROUND THE ASSOCIATION
• The Philadelphia 76ers beat the Atlanta Hawks 90-76 to improve to 11-4, their best start since starting 11-4 in 2002-03.

• LaMarcus Aldrige had 33 points, 23 rebounds and five assists to lead the Portland Trail Blazers over the Toronto Raptors. He is only the sixth player in the last 25 seasons to reach those threshold in a single game and the first to do it since Kevin Garnett in 2003-04.

• The Detroit Pistons scored 81 points in a loss to the Memphis Grizzlies. It’s Pistons’ 16th straight game they have failed to score 100 points, their third-longest such streak in the shot-clock era.

A new season means a new outlook on game-winning shots for Miami Heat guard Dwyane Wade.

Wade's game-winning layup on Friday was his second game-winning field goal in as many days.

Before making the game-winner against the Bobcats on Thursday, Wade had missed his last ten potential game winning or tying attempts with under 10 seconds left in the fourth quarter or overtime.

In the previous four seasons, Wade was a combined 4-for-37 (11 percent) from the field on these shots, the second worst field goal percentage in the league. Joe Johnson was the only one worse in that span -- (2-for-23, 8.7 percent).

Wade is 6-for-7 this season on shots that have been generated off side-out-of-bounds situations. This was his only such shot attempt in this game, capping a contest in which the Heat went 6-for-6 on possessions that came off side-outs.

This was the fifth time in his career that LeBron James played on his birthday, the second time he won (he’s won his last two birthday games). In those five games, he’s averaging 35 points, shooting 56 percent from the field.

James notched his 38th career 30-point, 10-assist game on Friday, the last assist coming on Wade’s hoop. It's the most such games among active players, one more than Wade.

Elsewhere in the NBA
Nifty 50
Dwight Howard notched the 50th game of his career with at least 20 rebounds, his second such game in a row. His 50 are the most of any active player, eight more than Ben Wallace.

Memories of The Dutchman
Roy Hibbert had 17 points and 13 rebounds on Friday for the Pacers, his third double-double in three games this season.

Hibbert is the first Pacers player to start a season with at least 10 points and 10 rebounds in his team's first three games since Rik Smits in 1991-92.

Elias Stat of the Night
With the Detroit Pistons loss to the Boston Celtics, Pistons head coach Lawrence Frank has now lost 20 consecutive games as a head coach (17 of those were with the New Jersey Nets) joining Byron Scott as just the second coach in the last 10 years to lose 20 or more consecutive games.

Plus-Minus Stat of the Night
Dallas Mavericks center Ian Mahinmi was a plus-21 in his team’s first win of the season, a 99-86 triumph over the Toronto Raptors, a 35-point swing for him. He was minus-14 in a buzzer-beating loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder on Thursday night.

It was the second best plus-minus for Mahinmi in his career, a point shy of his best, which came last season in a win over the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Mahinmi was 6-for-6 from the field, the second time in his career that he made at least six baskets in a game without missing a shot.

David Thorpe dropped by HoopSpeak Live on Thursday to talk a little Orlando Magic and, specifically, about how the team operates under the direction of Stan Van Gundy.

Even as the Magic fell from the league's elite last season, they still ranked No. 3 in defensive efficiency. Having a presence like Dwight Howard patrolling the paint in the half court certainly anchors a defense, but the Magic's success is predicated on more than just allowing its perimeter defenders to crowd their assignments because Howard can clean up any mess.

As Thorpe describes it, the Magic are committed to a few basic -- but essential -- defensive principles.

You can watch hours of Magic basketball and be hard-pressed a Grade A screw-up defending the pick-and-roll. That foundation, in turn, allows the Magic to defend the perimeter and prevent teams from lighting them up from beyond the arc. When two men can handle pick-and-roll duty or, if they can't, the back-line big rotates swiftly, perimeter defenders can stay at home.

The Magic might have to play under a cloud of uncertainty regarding Howard, but good coaching and a defensive system that works can keep the Magic in the top third of the Eastern Conference ... so long as the roster remains largely intact.



Thorpe discusses his favorite rookies from this year's class with Zach Harper here.

Kevin Durant showed himself to be the ultimate scoring option for the Oklahoma City Thunder in their dramatic win over the Dallas Mavericks on Thursday night.

Here’s a rundown of some of our noteworthy research nuggets from his buzzer-beating shot, the first in the NBA this season.

• It was the third game-winning buzzer-beater for the Thunder since the team moved to Oklahoma City, the seventh by the franchise in the last 10 seasons.

Durant's others came on Nov. 16, 2007 against the Hawks and Jan. 22, 2011 against the Knicks. His three game-winning buzzer-beaters since the start of the 2007-08 season are tied for the most in the NBA in that span.

• It’s only the second come-from-behind such shot for the Thunder in that span (meaning the shot came while trailing in the game), the other being Jeff Green’s against the Warriors on Jan. 21, 2009.

• Durant is the fourth player in the last 30 seasons to start a season by scoring at least 30 points in his team's first four games. He joins elite company, as noted in the chart on the right.

• In the last four seasons, Durant has 101 games in which he scored at least 30 points, the most in the NBA in that span.

• Video review shows that Durant has opened the season by making 9 of 18 shots in catch-and-shoot situations. Last season, Durant shot 43 percent on catch-and-shoots, fifth-best on his own team.

• Through four games, Durant has scored 125 points. The other starters for Oklahoma City have combined to score 135 points.

• This is the fourth game-winning buzzer-beating 3-pointer for the Thunder/SuperSonics franchise in the last 10 seasons. That matches the most of any team in that time period, tied with the Wizards, Kings, Knicks and Lakers.

• The last NBA regular-season game with two go-ahead 3-pointers with less than three seconds remaining also involved Durant and the Thunder.

It was Jan. 2, 2009 (Nuggets at Thunder), when Kevin Durant hit a 3-pointer with 2.7 seconds left to put the Thunder ahead before Carmelo Anthony hit a 3-pointer with 0.1 seconds left to give the Nuggets the win.

The Thunder had four wins after that game as well. The loss made them 4-30 for the season.

• The Mavericks lost on a buzzer-beating shot for the second straight season (Arron Afflalo beat them last February). Prior to Afflalo’s shot, the Mavericks went three seasons without allowing a buzzer-beater.

• The buzzer-beater may not have happened had the Mavericks made some of their easier shots early in the quarter. Dallas was 0-for-9 in the paint in the final 12 minutes of the game.

• The loss dropped the Mavericks to 0-3, making them the second defending champion to start a season 0-3. The Elias Sports Bureau notes that the other is the 1969-70 Boston Celtics, the season after Bill Russell retired.

Other statistical highlights
Howard dominates
Dwight Howard finished with 24 rebounds Thursday versus the Nets, two shy of his career high.

It was his 49th career 20-rebound game, the most among active players.

Plus-Minus Note of the Night
The San Antonio Spurs were outscored by 28 points with Tim Duncan on the floor on Thursday night.

His minus-28 is the third-worst plus-minus he's had in any regular-season game in his career, surpassed by a pair of minus-29 games against the Lakers (in the 2003-04 and 2010-11 seasons).