American basketball fans are getting new rumors about NBA players going overseas every hour, but it's worth noting just how important these signings are for the local populations. While most Euroleague countries have impressive basketball traditions, they still consider the NBA the best league in the world. Any association with it is an important one.

However, certain players are not worth a demigod's welcome. Take Corey Maggette, 12-season veteran and newest member of PAOK, a Greek club based in the city of Thessaloniki. Maggette has regularly put up impressive stats, but he plays a style that can best described as soul-sucking. He's a black hole, stops offensive flows in its tracks, and often looks like he's more interested in drawing fouls than in getting the best possible shot.

Earlier this week, Maggette arrived in Greece to thunderous cheering. On Thursday, Kelly Dwyer picked out a news report claiming there were hundreds of fans to greet him. But that description does not

We are living in a golden age for basketball video games. Graphics and gameplay get more realistic every year, and the rise of extras like NBA 2K's legends challenges add impressive depth. These games are their own worlds at this point, not just simulacra of the real thing.

Of course, gamers did not always have it so great. Check out this video from the 1979 arcade game "Basketball," in which two men with very serious hip problems glide across a basketball court and take exceedingly poor aim at their respective baskets. I'm not sure what sort of basketball this is, but it must have been cribbed from a few games at an assisted-living centers in Antarctica.

We don't have the NBA right now. But at least we can entertain ourselves with fake games that bear some resemblance to the real thing. Or who knows, maybe the NBA really was this bad back before David Stern saved the league.

For three seasons, Marreese Speights has been a promising, if not exactly impressive, member of the Philadelphia 76ers frontcourt. Speights caught the team's eye during the 2008 draft primarily because of his physical gifts: He's tall, built, and athletic. If he ever developed some more skills, he'd have a long NBA career.

Athleticism usually doesn't turn off -- it's considered an innate quality for a reason. Sometimes, though, the man who possesses it expects too much. For proof, check out the video of Speights above from a game in his rookie season against Denver. He takes a pass in the paint, gets set to jam it home, and promptly comes up short, slamming the ball into the ground and out of bounds.

Speights, to his credit, ended the game with 12 points in just 18 minutes. Unfortunately, given that he seems to be less a part of the Sixers' future plans with each passing season, we'll probably remember this performance more for a hilarious failure than for a display of nascent

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Americans know Shaquille O'Neal as a man of many talents: athlete, actor, rapper, basketball analyst, reality TV personality, and prolific tweeter. Still, despite his show "Shaq Vs." where he tried his hands at various sports, he has not made much of a name for himself on the playing fields of other games. Mostly because the majority of sports are not made for 7-foot-1 giants.

That especially goes for baseball, where height only enlarges a player's strike zone and forces him to cover more of the plate. Nevertheless, Shaq seems to be at least quite capable at the plate. Because, if a story from Kevin Garnett is to be believed, the Shaqtan of Swat hit a ball over the Green Monster at Fenway Park. From CSN New England (via SB Nation):

Garnett recalled a softball game that the Celtics played at Fenway Park. Garnett said he hit one ball off of the Green Monster. He said Rajon Rondo hit two off the Wall and Shaquille O'Neal, of course, knocked one over the Monster.

"Shaq's the business, man," Garnett said. "It was truly an honor to play with him. "This year was the most fun I've had in the NBA in a long time."

Man, why couldn't there have been video of this trip to Fenway? I bet Rondo hits with his hands reversed on the bat, just like Hank Aaron used to before he made the majors.

104949102Ron Artest, who will take on the name Metta World Peace in a few short weeks, has been in the news quite a bit lately for reasons unrelated to basketball. In addition to the name change, he'll be a contestant on "Dancing with the Stars" this fall, where he'll probably dress in funny clothes and do bizarre routines just like he does in everyday life.

Sometimes, though, Artest thinks about basketball. In fact, he recently predicted that the Lakers will win a championship this season, should the playoffs even happen in 2012. From Mark Medina for the Los Angeles Times:

But Artest guaranteed to ESPN Los Angeles' Stephen A. Smith in a 40-minute interview Wednesday that the Lakers will again pop the champagne bottles after winning the 2012 NBA title. Assuming there's a season of course.

"Win it all," Artest said when asked what will the Lakers do in the 2011-2012 season. "Win the whole thing. That's a guarantee." [...]

Smith then asked what can the general public do to Artest should his guarantee go sour.

"We're going to win," he answered. "You can do anything you want to do. Whatever you want to do, you do it."

Cool, I guess if the Lakers don't win the championship we are all going over to the World Peace villa for a night of decadent debauchery. See you there! I'll be the one wearing a monkey mask.

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Ever since the lockout became official on July 1, fans have been grasping for any sort of positive news. There's been so much posturing and double-talk that it's been difficult to pretend that things are going to get better soon. By all indications so far, the loss of a full season seems like a real possibility.

On Wednesday, fans got a glimmer of hope when David Stern and the Players Association met for collective bargaining talks. No specific details have emerged from the sixth-hour meeting. However, that lack of post-meeting media spin can be considered a positive in itself. Here's what Howard Beck of The New York Times reported on Twitter from the scene:

Derek Fisher emerges from 6hr bargaining session, declines to characterize talks. But sides will keep meeting. #lockout

Fisher also said parties agreed to dispense with the rhetoric and public shots at each other. All positive signs, IMHO.

More meetings are scheduled, but parties will not specify when and where. 

Stern and Silver

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Like most of the Lakers, Pau Gasol had a pretty unimpressive playoffs. In 10 games against the Hornets and Mavs, he averaged 13.1 ppg on just 42 percent shooting from the field. Worse yet, he seemed to be playing with little fire and determination. For a player who was deemed one of the two or three best big men in the league during the 2010 playoffs, it was a notable fall from grace.

This summer, Gasol is part of the stacked Spain squad at the European Championships. Winning the tournament would help his reputation, even if EuroBasket isn't the biggest stage in America. Still, Gasol isn't putting too much pressure on himself to perform well as a way of atoning for his playoff failures. From Ben Bolch for the Los Angeles Times (via PBT):

In the playoffs last spring Gasol and the Lakers were run ragged by Nowitzki's Dallas Mavericks. The Lakers power forward was also besieged by unsubstantiated rumors of a rift with his girlfriend, and was the subject of finger-pointing by fans disappointed with his play, and a jab to the chest by coach Phil Jackson during the Western Conference semifinal sweep.

"I do not think there's anything to prove on my side," Gasol said via email when asked if he was eager to put the Lakers' postseason behind him. "Last season we didn't perform during the playoffs as we were supposed to. . . . You cannot win every year; there are a lot of very good teams in the league."

The typical American sports narrative is that a disgraced player should come back from disappointment with a fanatical devotion to improve his game and make himself more impressive in the eyes of the sporting public. Gasol, to his credit, is taking a more measured approach.

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When it comes to the upper class of fandom, Clipper Darrell is perhaps the king of kings. Rooting on a team that's given him little to cheer for, he nevertheless makes ridiculous amounts of noise, wears a blue-and-red suit, and generally reps for a franchise that does not deserve a fan of his loyalty. I mean, it even sold his seats for one game this year. That's like telling Wavy Gravy he can't hang out on stage at a Grateful Dead show.

Understandably, Darrell is upset at the prospect of not having any NBA games to attend this year. Not surprisingly, he has plans to show the Clippers and the NBA how much he cares. Except, unlike most protesters, he is going to take things lying down. Because he's going to stage a sleep-in at Staples Center (puns!). From Larry Brown Sports, a site that is sadly not run by the former NBA coach (via EOB):

Clipper Darrell first mentioned the sleepover protest on his twitter account August 16th. "I WANT BASKETBALL BACK!! The LA Clippers finally get a superstar & now it's an NBA lockout. I WILL SLEEP @STAPLES starting OCT.1 ..are u in?" Clipper Darrell wrote. He's been running a countdown to the sleepover, mentioning it every few days. He's even trying to recruit other people to join him "All NBA fans arena & restaurant employees camera people & anybody else this affects on Oct 1 protest lockout sleep over Staples Center."

Darrell says he won't leave Staples Center until the lockout ends but I don't buy it. What he doesn't realize is that this is going to go on through at least the end of the year. No way he goes Ghandi on everyone and remains at Staples for months — it's just not going to happen.

I would not be so sure, Larry Brown. Darrell is fiercely committed to his cause, enough so that he would sleep outside a basketball arena for an entire year to prove a point. Sure, things might get weird on nights when the NHL's Los Angeles Kings play, but Darrell can hold his own in those situations.