Is "Baller" Trademarked Yet?

Every year, there are moves that seem to be surefire hits, horrible moves, and moves that nobody saw coming.  The ones that I like to think the most about are the decisions that do not make any sense to me.  In this post, I will discuss the 4 moves that I thought confused me to a large extreme and 4 that weren’t as major and there’s more logic behind.     New Orleans Point Guard Situation New Orleans ended last season with an apparent excess of guards, with Lonzo Ball, Eric Bledsoe, Nickeil Alexander-Walker, and Kira Lewis as possible options at the 1 and Zion Williamson showing glimpses of being a point forward.   The Pelicans first traded Bledsoe and Steven Adams to create cap space, which was seemingly used to try to target Kyle Lowry, despite rumors that he would favor Miami or Philadelphia in free agency.   They proceeded to whiff on Lowry (no surprise there) and allow Lonzo Ball to walk, where they got back Tomas Satoransky, Garrett Temple, an...

The offseason always seems to result in questions and major decisions for teams whether it’s from the draft, free agency, trades, or extensions.  This year, while there have been rumors related to several superstars, there are two players who I think are fascinating:  Ben Simmons, whose trade rumors are been widely discussed, and Kyrie Irving, whose eligibility for a contract extension has been barely discussed.  In post, I discuss the conundrum related to each and what I think the right decision is.   Should the 76ers trade Ben Simmons? Everyone seems to be saying that Simmons should have been traded long ago, but I think this situation should be treated more delicately, which is also the approach Darryl Morey appears to be taking. I think the case for the Simmons/Joel Embiid pairing not working is something that shouldn’t be as clunky as it is at times if they had better shooters (it seemed to work better the year they had JJ Redick, Robert Covington, and D...

The NBA Draft has been completed and now that I finally figured out who was traded and where everyone will be playing, I have completed my grades for the Draft.  I only included draft selections and trades on draft day (or right before draft day that I never addressed in the blog) involving draft picks; as such, Minnesota will not be included here despite trading Ricky Rubio on that day since no 2021 picks were involved.  Additionally, I will not punish teams for moves that didn’t occur (i.e. I won’t punish the Warriors for not trading the 7 th and 14 th picks for Bradley Beal when that trade didn’t sound like this was an option) or for anything that was out of their control (especially won’t punish teams for not being able to select a player who was already drafted).  I also emphasized how I thought the fit with the team (based on long-term or short-term depending on the situation of the team) in my grades more than how I evaluated any given player or if they could hav...