A season that changed Phoenix Suns basketball for the better started with the signing of Chris Paul, who immediately made his way to Phoenix to get up shots along side Devin Booker. From that point on, you knew that this season was going to be special. It didn take too long, after an 8-8 start to the season, this years Suns team began to take off and take the NBA by storm. The main reason Paul. Finishing 5th in this years MVP voting sells Paul's season short. He was the reason that this Suns team finished with the 2nd best record in the West with a 51-21 record and managing to play and start 70 of the 72 games this season. Nuggets center Nikola Jokic is a well deserving of the MVP winner and picked his game up with the absence of Jamal Murray. There wasn ever a question about who would win but where would Paul land in the voting results https://www.phoenixfanstoreonline.com/Cameron_Payne_Pet_Jersey-62. The presentation of the MVP trophy to Jokic will be interesting. The response by Paul and the Suns will be something to watch if Jokic does hoist the award before a game in this series. To me, the focus will remain the same and fuel is already there for this team. The way that Paul managed his minutes like a LeBron James during the season hurt his chances of gaining more first place votes. But it was smart. The way that Paul plays now is to be a finisher and to get the W. Paul still finished the season with 16 Frank Kaminsky T-Shirt. 4 points and 8. 9 assists. Great stats for managing his minutes and his clutch play in the 4th quarter of games was second to none. The same way he helped the Oklahoma City Thunder last year close games, he did the same here in the Valley. At the mid-season point, there was a way for Paul to gain more attention, and that was to help Suns center Deandre Ayton get to the next level. And he did. Ayton played the second half of the season with great energy and showed a better understanding of where to be on the court, on the defensive end and offensive end. But Paul did that for all his teammates. Let hope Paul is ready to restructure his contract and stay with the Suns on a long term deal to end his career with deep playoff runs. To not resign the player who turned this franchise around would be a mistake. After dropping 21 points and 11 assists in the Suns first game against the Denver Nuggets https://www.phoenixfanstoreonline.com/Charles_Barkley_Pillow_Cover-63, Paul and the Suns are now focused on winning a championship. The Finals MVP is something I am sure Paul will feel as more special over the regular season award.

Exciting times in the house! The Nets have signed two of the NBA top players and to celebrate our good fortune as a fan base, the biggest fan and principal owner, Mikhail Prokhorov, is ready to answer your Nets questions!In an exclusive arrangement with NetsDaily https://www.brooklynfanstoreonline.com/Nicolas_Claxton_Face_Mask-134, the principal owner (governor) will take five questions about the team from our fans. Here how it will work: Post the question you want answered in the comments. Wel sort through them and choose five, based on originality and value to the fan base at large. If you don want to submit a question yourself, you can ecthose you like. That will help us choose the ones we will forward to Moscow Mike James T-Shirt. Prokhorov will get back to us with his answers https://www.brooklynfanstoreonline.com/Drazen_Petrovic_T_shirt-8. Wel want to get your questions to Prokhorov as soon as possible. He is, after all, a busy man. So wee setting a deadline of 9 a. m. Tuesday for submissions. This will also give the fans a head start on the media at the Nets introductory press conference (which has yet to be scheduled). So go for it!

Some fans in Orlando still haven gotten over the 1995 NBA Finals. The Orlando Magic seemed to have Game 1 in hand before letting it slip away and ultimately getting swept by the Houston Rockets. It didn exactly make the teams even, but the Magic got some revenge the following season by sweeping the regular season series while handing the Rockets a pair of heartbreaking losses. The second of those came on this day 25 years ago. Less than a month after Anfernee Hardaway game-winner lifted the Magic past Houston on Christmas Day, it was Shaquille Oeal who did in the Rockets at The Summit, 97-96. For the second time in as many meetings https://www.storeorlando.com/Penny_Hardaway_Pet_Jersey-63, Houston held an eight-point lead in the fourth quarter on Jan. 21, 1996. Orlando however, responded with a 16-7 run before Mark Bryant basket gave the Rockets a 96-95 lead with 28. 1 seconds to play. Orlando was unable to hold for the final shot initially Shaquille O'Neal Pillow Cover, but an offensive rebound made that possible. Throughout the early parts of the 1995-96 season, game-winning shots had been a Hardaway specialty. Hardaway had spurred the comeback, but it was forward Dennis Scott who fired away with the shot clock winding down. Scott three-point shot was no good, but Oeal was able to grab the rebound and put it back in with just 4. 7 seconds remaining. With time for one last shot for Houston, Oeal played hero on the other end, blocking Sam Cassell attempt at the rim as time expired. Oeal finished with 29 points and a game-high 16 rebounds. To go with a game-high 13 assists and a team-high four steals, Hardaway finished with 28 points, but scored 13 of those in the final quarter to spur the comeback. After trailing by eight, it was Hardaway trey that drew the Magic even at 90 with 2:40 remaining. Hardaway would answer with a pair of dunks to give Orlando a one-point lead each time. His final points of the night answered a jumper from Hakeem Olajuwon, who led Houston with a game-high 30 points, and gave Orlando a 95-94 lead. In addition to Olajuwon 30 points and 11 boards, Clyde Drexler scored 20 points for Houston in the loss https://www.storeorlando.com/Shaquille_Oneal_Pet_Jersey-143. Cassell and Bryant each added 14 points while Robert Horry scored 10 to go along with a game-high 10 assists. During Oeal time in Orlando, the Magic and Olajuwon Rockets split 12 meetings. Although Houston swept the Magic in the 1995 NBA Finals, Shaq would not only get the win over he Dream, but he would play the role of hero. He did so on this day a quarter-century ago.

Maybe the Phillies shouldn be the ones scared of their schedule https://www.philadelphiagearstore.com/Dave_Cash_Hoodie-90. Maybe their schedule should be afraid of the Phillies.When the 2021 season began, the Phils faced an uphill battle. The season first month was brought with playoff teams, potential playoff teams, and division rivals. For a squad that failed to reach the postseason for the ninth straight year last year, it was not exactly a schedule that one would assume would launch them into the stratosphere.And yet, after the season first six games, three against Atlanta and three against the Mets, all at Citizens Bank Park, the Phillies find themselves 5-1 with a 2.5 game lead over the Mets and Nationals and a three-game lead over the three-time defending NL East champion Braves. All those games were at home, and the first week of the season is no indication of anything other than the small sample size of six games in a 162-game crucible https://www.philadelphiagearstore.com/Jim_Eisenreich_T_shirt-34. The old baseball axiom states you can never win a division title in April, but you can sure lose one. Well, as we witnessed in 1993 when the Phils went 17-5, getting off to a hot April can be a springboard that catapults them into the cat bird seat. And with a 5-1 start, they have the chance to do just that.However, now the hard part begins.The NL East is going to be tough all season. Despite winning five of their first six games for only the sixth time in team history, it by no means secures anything other than first place after 3.7% of the season has been completed. The Phils now must play their first road games of the season, starting with three games in Atlanta against a Braves team that will want revenge. Four games in New York against the Mets will follow, followed by a homestead against the best team in the NL Central, the St. Louis Cardinals (featuring Nolan Arenado and Paul Goldschmidt), and Gabe Kapler return to Philadelphia with the San Francisco Giants. The Phillies then hit the road with a three-game series against the lowly Colorado Rockies, but then must travel to St. Louis for a tough four-game match-up against the Cards once again. The first game of another home series against the Mets closes out the month.Of course, it too early to even know which teams on the schedule will be problems and which will be cupcakes Connor Brogdon T-Shirt. Many times during the course of a season, teams perceived to be ood at the start of the season underachieve, and so-called ad teams end up being better than people think. Strength of schedule is interesting, but it not locked in stone. Heck, the NL East was thought to be one of the toughest divisions in baseball but right now, only one team has a winning record (your Philadelphia Phillies!). The only thing the first week of the season has done is give the Phils a chance to get off to a great start. Getting off to a great start does now always equate with success. The ghosts of 1964, 1995 and 2018 remind us of that, but it does put them in a much stronger position to be in the mix later in the year. That the Phillies have done this when their greatest asset, their offense, has largely underperformed thus far, is especially encouraging.This upcoming 7-game road trip in Atlanta and New York will be a truly interesting test for what has proven to be a very interesting teams one week into the 2021 MLB season.