This Week In Basketball can only lead off in one place: Houston ... we have quite a head coach
I'm testing out a new format with one of my go-to column presentations. Input is welcomed and encouraged
Comeback Coach of the Year is not a real thing in the NBA.
Maybe it should be this season.
Ime Udoka's first season on Houston's bench after a season in exile has exceeded all reasonable expectations. The Rockets have won eight games in a row to pull within a game of Golden State for the 10th seed and the final play-in berth in the Western Conference … with six of those wins coming in the wake of what was billed as a likely season-ending ankle injury for Alperen Şengün, also known as Houston's best player, on March 10.
#thisleague indeed.
The best basketball of Jalen Green's career, combined with Udoka's change-the-culture proddings, has resuscitated the Rockets' season from premature presumptions of playing out the string and made the Western Conference stretch run even more entertaining than it already was.
There are actually four absorbing West races to track now involving 11 teams … after it was widely assumed coming out of the All-Star break that we already knew its 10 teams that would qualify for the postseason.
There is the Nuggets/Thunder/Timberwolves battle for West slots 1 through 3 … followed by the Clippers' dwindling lead over the Pelicans in the 4 vs. 5 tussle … followed by the Suns/Kings/Mavericks love triangle from 6 through 8 … and capped by the Rockets' stubborn (and wholly unexpected) insistence on crashing an unwanted duel for No. 9 and No. 10 that the Lakers and Warriors have been unable to escape.
My kind of March Madness!
PS — As I've mentioned often previously, I loved loved LOVED This Week In Baseball in my youth and have frequently compiled what I referred to as TWIB Notes on this Substack to pay homage to the great Mel Allen and that life-changing show which debuted in 1977. Now I'm trying something new with this file. I plan to make it more of a roundup every Sunday of what I wrote, said, did, saw and maybe even ate, bought, etc., in a given week … with categories that I suspect will evolve as I get a better handle on what this piece should look like.
Stories of the Week (published here)
Monday: My breakdown of the MVP race with (at the time of publishing) a month to go in the regular season.
Tuesday: Photo editor Aaron Stein's photo gallery from the Buzzer-Beater Game of the Season.
Games of the Week (that I attended)
Thursday: Mavericks 113, Jazz 97
(This was my lone live in-person sporting intake of the week because I completely bricked the opportunity to see United States 2, Mexico 0 in the CONCACAF Nations League title game Sunday night at Jerryworld. #absolutefail)
Podcasts of the Week (that I co-hosted)
Monday with Turner Sports' Chris Haynes:
Saturday with Turner Sports' Chris Haynes:
Radio Show of the Week (that I hosted)
The Saturday Stein Line on 97.1 (FM) The Freak:
PS — And my Radio Guest Spot of the Week with Sportsnet 590 AM in Canada:
Video Essay of the Week (that I wrote)
On the aforementioned MVP race for Bally Sports Southwest:
Scoopage of the Week (that I tweeted)
Sadness of the Week
I was crushed to learn that one of the greatest sportswriters in the history of the profession died Tuesday.
The versatile M. Emmet Walsh left us at 88 and left us with unforgettable memories of his performance as Dickie Dunn in Slap Shot … Charlestown Chiefs beat writer and the scribe who invented the catchphrase that anyone who has spent any time in this business has strived for since the peerless hockey movie debuted in February 1977: "Well, I was trying to capture the spirit of the thing, Reg."
If you somehow haven’t watched Slap Shot yet … do I even have to tell you what to do ASAP?
Walsh also played the greatest diving coach in cinematic history with his turn as Coach Turnbull in Back To School. His unforgettable line regarding the senior citizen on his substitute roster (found between 4:11 and 4:22 in the seminal clip below) lives forever in the same pantheon for this Substack up there with Reg Dunlop exclaiming: "Dickie Dunn wrote this. It's gotta be true."
Also: Walsh needed no further street cred here, but he also had a role in one of my five favorite basketball movies of all-time: The Fish That Saved Pittsburgh. I frankly loved him in every one of these incarnations.
Quote of the Week
If you actually listened to what LeBron James said on his maiden podcast alongside JJ Redick, he made it pretty clear that he regards Stephen Curry and Allen Iverson as the two most influential players in basketball since James himself entered the league starting with the 2003-04 season. I don't really understand why this was ever painted as some sort of controversial statement. James acknowledged Michael Jordan from the jump in the enclosed clip and clearly was trying to get across that he was referring to the NBA's post-MJ years with his observations.
" … The most influence on the game – and obviously we know what Mike did for the game – Steph and Allen Iverson are the two biggest influential guys in our game since I’ve been watching and covering it," James told Redick.
So why Quote of the Week status if there's no controversy?
Simple.
I can't ever remember LeBron saying anything before about "covering" the league. Does he consider himself part of the NBA media now?
I suspect we'd take him if so.
LeBron is a bit full of himself, but he’s more than earned it - unlike in his first few years when he was King James without a kingdom.