New Orleans Pelicans

[koontz_circle]

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just droppin' by to show some respect sa N.O. Hornets. if maka daog man gani ang Hornets against my Spurs i'll be back here to extend my greetings & give some pat on the back to each and every Hornets fan.

series in progress.. goodluck for both the spurs n hornets.

[The Good$!!!]

just droppin' by to show some respect sa N.O. Hornets. if maka daog man gani ang Hornets against my Spurs i'll be back here to extend my greetings & give some pat on the back to each and every Hornets fan.

series in progress.. goodluck for both the spurs n hornets.

Much appreciated bai... ^^

Same to you and your Silver Dollar Dancers hehehehehe...

Oh BTW, my opinion lang but mas ganahan unta ko si Timmy ma 1st team all NBA instead ni KG... I know we both idolize the Big Fundamentals...^^

[The Good$!!!]

By J.A. Adande
ESPN.com

NEW ORLEANS -- Chris Paul has become the must-see player in these playoffs, the one doing the most amazing things with the greatest regularity, the one worth flying 1,700 miles across two time zones to see.


Well, there was another reason I wanted to come down to the Big Easy. I had to confront and question him on this little theory I've developed: Chris Paul is a mean guy.


When I say this to him, he doesn't offer a rebuttal, only a justification.


"I hate to lose," he said.

Chris Paul's got something to say, and it might not be diplomatically delivered.
He's the opposite of some of the great point guards to whom he's compared, the ones whose angelic looks masked a darker side. Isiah Thomas wore a continuous smile on the court but could be treacherous off it (ask Adrian Dantley). John Stockton looked clean-cut but was one of the dirtiest players in the league (ask anyone who ever caught one of his elbows).


Paul has a friendly reputation, but he's as nasty a competitor as you'll find.


You see Chris Paul smiling and dancing in his commercials, promoting Louisiana tourism or narrating an NBA Cares ad. Do you ever see that persona on the court?


In uniform, while the clock ticks down 12 minutes times four, Paul is as nasty as it gets, all glares and angry words, jumping on every teammates' slightest mistake.


"I don't want to say he's like Jekyll and Hyde," David West said, "but he has to change who he is a little bit to be able to go out there and compete and get the results that he wants."


West should know. Paul calls the power forward one of his best friends on the team, but says the two go at it on the court as much as anyone.


Take the open shot. Go to the right place. Be more aggressive. Foul harder.


"Just wherever he sees something lacking, he'll let you know," West said. "And that's a good thing. He's not going to hold his tongue."


Just remember, Paul always operates under this basic premise: "They know it's nothing personal. I want to win."


Before the game, Paul is as friendly as a mom baking cookies. Monday night he was the first one on the court for shooting practice, so by the time his teammates wandered out to get their jumpers in, he was done, reclining on the sideline, taking in the Pistons-Magic game on the scoreboard screen. He sat up for a quick chat, happy to talk ball, while fans, arena workers, the flag honor guards, all stop by to say hi and wish him well.


He talked about how much he loves this team, how it would be fine with him if the roster stayed the same forever, and how he's motivated to keep winning in these playoffs because he doesn't want this group to split up for the summer.


He talked about what he's learned in his three years in the league, most notably how unwise it is for a man his size (6-0, 175) to keep driving all the way to the basket (that's why his free-throw attempts dropped from 465 his rookie season to 390 this season).


He said his "Big Easy" lobs to Tyson Chandler just come naturally, but he's learned other things about his teammates over time, such as how Peja Stojakovic is most effective from the farthest corner on the baseline, not closer in.


For the captains' meeting before the game, Paul greeted Tim Duncan and Tony Parker with big hugs. Official Dick Bavetta wanted a hug, too, so Paul showed him some love.


But during the game, he scowled at the officials when they let him get roughed up without blowing the whistle. He glared at Chandler when Chandler let Duncan get free for a layup. He gave a quick "gotcha" look to Bruce Bowen after hitting a 3-pointer in Bowen's face.


And a couple of minutes after a botched fast break, he was still getting on Stojakovic for running alongside Julian Wright and disrupting a lob pass instead of pulling up in jump-shot range.


"Stop," Paul advised him as they waited for a timeout to end. "Stop. I kept asking myself, 'When is he going to stop?'"


The thing is, if his teammates go to the right places, Paul will get them the ball. Every time.


Again and again, Paul disappears into a thicket of taller players in the paint and the ball suddenly materializes at the rim for a Chandler or West dunk, or out on the sidelines for a Stojakovic 3-pointer.


Paul knows exactly when to pull up for a jumper or when to use a burst of speed for a layup. He controls the game with an easy foot on the accelerator. For someone who has no tolerance for teammates who take too long to get to their spots on offense (he says it's because their plays take so long to run there's no time to spare), Paul has an incredible amount of patience when he's dribbling. He'll direct players to the right spot, survey the scene, then get to it.


Paul's 12.1 assists per game in the playoffs are 3½ better than the runner-up, Deron Williams. And Paul has committed only nine turnovers in seven playoff games, even though he has the ball in his hands more than Larry Johnson did with the NFL's Chiefs a couple of years ago. And he's giving you 24 points per night, as well? You can't name a player who's been as singularly important for a team that's been this successful in the playoffs to date.


Tony Parker was the MVP of the Spurs' first-round series, very quietly the third-leading scorer in the playoffs, and after two games the point-guard matchup in this series isn't close.


Paul makes you look again at how you define dominance, as he completely controls the game from well below the rim. And he's making you rethink the meaning of mean.


Maybe it isn't such a bad thing after all. After all, each week 23 million people watch Simon Cowell get all snippy on "American Idol." At least half of those folks should be checking out Paul. You won't find any better performers.


Yeahhhhh.... Bad Ass CP3...

[nab_uang]

I sense a lot of "bandwagon" fans crowding this thread if the Hornets beats the Spurs.

mao!!! abi kay pildihonon ang SPURS mo-paling dayon... mga "copycat" behaviour jud...

GO CAVS!!!

[Onins]

mao!!! abi kay pildihonon ang SPURS mo-paling dayon... mga "copycat" behaviour jud...

ay mo ana daghan au maigo ana

[The Good$!!!]

By Eric Neel
ESPN.com


True greatness tastes bittersweet.

Kobe Bryant beat out Chris Paul for the MVP award, but Chris Paul has been the brightest star of these playoffs so far.
Think back to first seeing Robert De Niro in "Taxi Driver," Prince live in the days of "Purple Rain" or Kerry Wood shutting down the Astros one by hapless one.


The very best performances are so perfectly pitched, you sense even as they're unfolding before your eyes how impossible they are, how they can't last, how they'll one day be undone by fame, vanity or Dusty Baker.

Chris Paul is that great right now. He's so great, it hurts to watch him.

He cuts hard left off that Tyson Chandler pick Monday night, jab-steps Tony Parker at the free-throw line -- like maybe he's going to shoot or maybe he's driving to the basket -- and then lobs a ball to Chandler for a dunk like a mesmerist moving objects in space just by thinking about it.

I'm not looking at a point guard. I'm looking at a damn miracle.

Part of it is that he didn't come to us the way LeBron did, prepackaged for greatness, so hyped that every remarkable thing about him feels ordinary and expected. And he didn't emerge -- as Kobe did -- alongside a giant, in the shadow of the Hollywood sign, below a baker's dozen's worth of championship banners. We didn't see Paul coming. We saw him selected fourth in an uninspiring 2005 draft, after a Bogut and two Williamses and just before a Felton. We figured he could play, but we weren't thinking he would bowl us over. Now every insane 30-15 line he posts is amplified by our surprise and delight at the way he's toying with Manu Ginobili on the perimeter or taking it to Tim Duncan at the rim.

Part of it is he's so ordinary looking, so (forgive me, Chris) small. You look at Kevin Garnett and you know you're looking at some extraordinary specimen even before you watch him play. Ditto LeBron and Kobe, whose ripped, long frames seem almost predictably tied to excellence. Paul is fit but not sculpted. He's the shortest guy on the floor most of the time. He's got this unassuming, slightly pigeon-toed walk and this young, seemingly guileless grin. And even though you know he's capable of stealing Jason Kidd's immortal soul, you're still dumbfounded when he completely dominates a Western Conference semifinal game.

Part of it is he's playing for the New Orleans Hornets. Which is to say he's not playing for the Suns or the Mavericks or the Spurs. Which is to say he's not just an outstanding player on a surprisingly good team, but he's someone we can view as a symbol, a turning of some historic page, a bellwether signaling the end of one era (that belonged to Kidd and Steve Nash) and the beginning of another.

Paul's constantly on the move, or at least he seems to be.
Part of it is he's young and he's been doing the great things he does in relative obscurity, and there are no seriously loaded, seriously disappointing narratives attached to him yet. He hasn't screwed up in the public eye (other than an ill-advised right hook to Julius Hodge's crotch a couple of years back). And he hasn't T-Mobilized his name into a campy brand, a la Dwyane Wade. His whole story right now is about basketball, about ridiculously proficient basketball in deliciously significant basketball games.


And the biggest part of it is he's head-butting his way up and under to easy buckets, and blowing by defenders in transition, and imagineering ball-fake assists we can't decode in slow-motion playbacks … and it all seems to come from this palpable, boundless reserve of energy somewhere inside him.

A lot has been made of his fearlessness, rightfully so. And a lot has been made of his poise under pressure, rightfully so. But the defining feature of Chris Paul right now is something even more elemental and impressive and captivating than those things. Chris Paul is being Chris Paul. Young, fast, creative, tough, eager and gifted. He's being Chris Paul completely. Without reservation. Tirelessly. Without complication.

It's an exhilarating thing to watch. Appointment television. Giggle television. But the measure of its greatness, play by play, game by game in these playoffs, is that I can't separate how much I love it from how certain I am that it's all too good to last.

[The Good$!!!]

Basaha...

http://www.nba.com/features/ravin_080509.html

[tackielarla]

Murag shag si Shaq gamay ana na angle.

[The Good$!!!]

Hehehehe our Hornets can go home to the Big Easy with a chip in their confidence...^^

Well what's more to say when you go up againts the defending champs...

No excuses, Hornets got beaten to the pulp with a more experience and battle tested team and a healthy TIm Duncan...^^

I do hope they can learn from this and the other starters like Peja and David must step up big time...

Stay aggressive and do not let the Spurs control the tempo of the game coz the Spurs can slow it down and feed Tim down low where he can easily take David and Tyson one on one or kick it back outside to an open jumpshot or let Manu and TP penetrate...

They need to learn fast and make adjustments... Boy, makita man jud ng katag ni Byron Scott hehehehe...



Chris Paul has been humbled and that is good!

Anyways, it's all good... That would even make the series more entertaining to follow...^^

As you can see; Tim, Manu, and TP can create their own plays and make their shots where as the Hornets needs to rely on Chris all the time to set them up and make plays by drawing double team through penetrations or running transition plays where the Hornets have been quite good at, or a kick out to spot up shooters like Mo pete and Peja... Although David and handle the ball a bit and drive to the lane, majority of the time, he need s CP3 to feed him for an easy bucket... Tyson need Chris all the time pretty much like K-Mart relies on Kidd back then...


What a humbling defeat hehehehehehe...

[fire starter]

series tied 2 - 2 naman... mainta home court advantage will work for the hornets.