Jack Winter Articles - Page 70

The Milwaukee Bucks have hired longtime league assistant Chad Forcier to coach Mike Budenholzer’s staff, according to Marc Stein of The New York Times. The Bucks are adding the veteran assistant Chad Forcier to Mike Budenholzer's coaching staff, league sources say — Marc Stein (@TheSteinLine) July 17, 2019 Forcier spent last season as an assistant […]

LeBron James has won three championships. He’s a four-time league MVP, 12-time All-NBA First Team honoree, and 18-time All-Star. By the time his career is finally, regrettably finished, James may be the top scorer in NBA history, an especially impressive possibility considering passing is broadly considered the best attribute of his game. Needless to say, […]

Rich Paul’s rise to the top of the sports agent world is complete. And nearly 20 years after first meeting Paul, his friend turned agent turned professional sports power broker, LeBron James is hardly surprised. The Athletic and The New York Times reported on Wednesday that United Talent Agency, one of the biggest talent agencies in Hollywood, is […]

Jimmy Garoppolo waited three and-a-half seasons for the chance to establish himself as a team’s full-time starter. And now that he’s entrenched as franchise quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers, Garoppolo has grown to understand the value of spending so much time as a young player sitting behind Tom Brady. The fifth-year veteran told The […]

Hue Jackson was finally relieved from his duties as head coach of the Cleveland Browns in late October of last season, after his long-struggling team got off to a 2-5-1 start. Two weeks later, the division-rival Cincinnati Bengals hired Jackson, whose expertise is on the offensive side of the ball, to be a special defensive […]

Before fracturing his left finger in mid-January, Anthony Davis was playing best basketball of his career, and it wasn’t particularly close. He averaged a ridiculous 33.2 points, 15.1 rebounds, 3.8 assists, 2.0 steals, and 2.1 blocks on 51.5 percent shooting in the 16 games leading up to the injury he suffered against the Portland Trail […]

The Minnesota Vikings have as little financial flexibility as any team in the NFL. They’re stacked at cornerback, too, with two-time Pro Bowler Xavier Rhodes, rising star Mackensie Alexander, and 2018 first-round pick Mike Hughes. As a result, one NFL analyst is calling for Minnesota to begin freeing itself of financial shackles by trading former […]

Emmanuel Sanders has been working typically hard to be ready for the start of the regular season after suffering a major injury in 2018. With training camp just a day away, though, the Denver Broncos star still hasn’t quite fully recovered. Sanders told The Athletic’s Nicki Jhabvala on Tuesday that he won’t be “full-go” for […]

The greatest achievement of LeBron James’ NBA career came after the Cleveland Cavaliers replaced coaches midway through the regular season. Next summer, we’ll find out if a mid-production switch at the helm of Space Jam 2 will yield similar results. According to Etan Vlessing of The Hollywood Reporter, Malcolm D. Lee has replaced Terence Nance as […]

Five months after being released by the Kansas City Chiefs, Eric Berry remains unsigned. If the Jacksonville Jaguars heed the advice of Bleacher Report’s Kristopher Knox, though, the veteran safety won’t be without a home in the NFL for long. In a post submitting what move every team in the league should make before kickoff […]

Eric Ebron, four years after being selected with the No. 10 pick of the 2014 draft, finally lived up to the hype during his debut season with the Indianapolis Colts. Now that he’s established himself as one of the most dynamic, productive tights ends in football, one NFL analyst believes the Colts should lock him […]

Faced with the prospect of losing Kevin Durant for nothing, the cash-strapped Golden State Warriors agreed to sign and trade the two-time MVP to his preferred destination of the Brooklyn Nets in exchange for D’Angelo Russell. From the very beginning, Russell’s acquisition by the Warriors was considered an asset play more than anything else. They […]

The Los Angeles Lakers finally brought in Anthony Davis, giving them arguably the best superstar tandem in the league. After waiting on Kawhi Leonard only to see him sign with their Staples Center rivals, the Lakers did well to fill out the roster choosing from a shallow pool of available free agents. Even so, that’s […]

The LA Clippers have enjoyed one of the most successful offseason in recent history, signing Kawhi Leonard, trading for Paul George, and filling out out their roster with multiple veterans capable of competing at the highest level. Doc Rivers’ team caught the league’s imagination as a gritty underdog during the first round of the playoffs; […]

There’s a fair amount of skepticism to be gleaned from the pairing of James Harden and Russell Westbrook. Jalen Rose, though, clearly believes the NBA’s latest superstar tandem has the potential to help the Houston Rockets reach new heights. On Monday’s edition of Get Up, the ESPN analyst dismissed questions about the fit of Harden […]

Washington Redskins quarterback Alex Smith still has a long road to recovery from the devastating injury that once called his career into question. But this latest step in that arduous process is still cause for celebration. Elizabeth Smith, married to the veteran signal-caller, posted a photo on Instagram of her husband holding the external fixator […]

Jayson Tatum disappointed in his sophomore season. Struggling to find his niche in the Boston Celtics’ offense, Tatum began forcing the issue far more often than he did as a rookie, trading spot-up three-pointers and dribble drives for pull-up long twos. His efficiency suffered as a result, and so did the Celtics at large. A […]

Anthony Davis is thrilled to be playing for the Los Angeles Lakers. Just because he was finally traded to the team of his choice, though, doesn’t mean the six-time All-Star is comfortable with one of the most frustrating complications of living in Southern California. Davis, believe it or not, is no fan of Los Angeles […]

Dwight Howard’s ballyhooed trade to the Los Angeles Lakers, needless to say, didn’t exactly go as planned. The Lakers were supposed to be basketball’s next best super team, adding Howard and Steve Nash to a two-time championship core of Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol, and Metta World Peace. It didn’t work out that way. Beset by […]

The New York Knicks were supposed to be this summer’s biggest winner. Even if their dreams of landing a superstar tandem with double-max cap space created by the Kristaps Porzingis trade never came to reality, the Knicks were still bound to leave free agency with at least one player poised to turn their franchise around. […]

Miles Bridges is one of the best overall athletes in the NBA. Now that the Charlotte Hornets have finally begun a long overdue rebuilding process, the rising sophomore forward will have far more opportunity to show it. And as this stunning Eurostep into a windmill dunk from Summer League action makes abundantly clear, basketball fans […]

It’s been just about three months since Trae Young last took the floor in a high-stakes basketball game. Perhaps finally scratching a nagging competitive itch, the Atlanta Hawks guard showed no mercy during a pickup game with kids participants at his youth camp. https://www.instagram.com/p/Bz3dFp9J5RE/ Young was the No. 5 overall pick of last year’s draft. […]

For the majority of his 16-year career, LeBron James has been considered the most well-rounded player in basketball. He’s always been among the league’s best playmakers, became an ultra-impactful defender over the final years of his initial stint with the Cleveland Cavaliers, and developed into a dangerous three-point shooter off the catch and the dribble […]

LeBron James played a bigger role in the Los Angeles Lakers’ acquisition of Anthony Davis than anyone else in the organization, and it wasn’t even close. Not only did his decision to sign with the Lakers last summer vault them back to legitimacy, but James is also close friends with the six-time All-Star. One of […]

LeBron James is best suited as a power forward in the modern NBA due to his defensive limitations. The same can certainly be said for Kyle Kuzma, perhaps to an even greater extent. DeMarcus Cousins is no longer entitled to major minutes, but certainly expects to play a significant role in 2019-20. JaVale McGee deserves […]

Rob Pelinka loves telling a story. The penchant for flowery hyperbole that helped him emerge as one of the sports world’s most high-profile agents has carried over to his role as general manager of the Los Angeles Lakers, but at least for now, to a more humorous effect than impactful one. The outright fabrication he […]

Eyebrows raised when the Memphis Grizzlies re-signed Jonas Valanciunas to a three-year, $45 million contract in free agency. Not because the seven-year pro, coming off arguably his best season in the NBA, isn’t worth that salary in a vacuum, but due to the fact that rising star Jaren Jackson Jr. will be best utilized at […]

It came as no surprise when owner Mark Cuban said recently that the Dallas Mavericks will subject Kristaps Porzingis to load management in 2019-20. After all, the Latvian sensation missed all of last season while recovering from a torn ACL, and there’s little to no precedent for a player of his size re-acclimating to the […]

Bojan Bogdanovic thoroughly enjoyed his tenure with the Indiana Pacers. In fact, the sweet-shooting forward seriously considered re-signing with the Pacers, and the fact his last contract offer from Indiana included a non-guarantee in the final year had nothing to do with his decision to leave. But as he told J. Michael of the Indianapolis […]

The Oklahoma City Thunder will be less competitive in 2019-20, and perhaps for several seasons afterward, than in any year since they re-located at the top of the decade. But just because general manager Sam Presti parted ways with All-NBA players Paul George and Russell Westbrook hardly means the Thunder come out losers of trades […]

Acquiring Terry Rozier, in a vacuum, made sense for the Charlotte Hornets. With a major hole at point guard due to the departure of Kemba Walker and finally committing to a long-awaited rebuilding process, the Hornets have both the time and opportunity to take a chance on a mostly unproven young veteran like Rozier. What […]

It’s easy to be critical of the Houston Rockets’ acquisition of Russell Westbrook. It’s still unclear who they were bidding against for a player on the downside of his career due approximately $170 million over the next four seasons. Prior to the trade, it was unclear whether or not Westbrook was a positive trade asset, […]

The Los Angeles Lakers missed out on free agency’s biggest name, costing them the chance to bring in so many helpful smaller ones. Now that the dust has settled with the Lakers’ roster mostly set and the cross-arena LA Clippers having emerged as his team’s chief competition in the Western Conference, Los Angeles general manager […]

Robert Williams’ talent was never a question. At 6-foot-10 with a ridiculous 7-foot-5 wingspan, effortless leaping ability, and borderline elite quickness for a player his size, he’s possessed the rough outline of a two-way impact player from the moment he caught the eyes of NBA scouts at Texas A&M. More than anything else, it was […]

Six weeks removed from straining his hamstring, Nick Bosa seems well on his way toward being ready for his first NFL training camp. The San Francisco 49ers rookie posted photos of himself working out with his older brother, Los Angeles Chargers defensive end Joey Bosa, on Friday, doing explosive exercises that seem to suggest his […]

Jadeveon Clowney has until Monday to sign a new multi-year deal with the Houston Texans, lest he play the 2019 season on the franchise tag. Whether he gets a new, market-value contract from the Texans, spends one final year in Houston before leaving in free agency next spring, or perhaps is traded to another team […]

Rolando McClain will never live up to the hype. Coming out of the University of Alabama in 2010 as a unanimous First Team All-American and Butkus Award winner, some draft analysts considered him the finest middle linebacker prospect in decades. Now four years removed from playing his last game in the NFL, McClain has no […]

The National Football League Players’ Association has already made it abundantly clear it has no interest in adding two games to the regular season schedule. The average length of an NFL player’s career is already far shorter than counterparts who play basketball, soccer, baseball, and more; going from 16 games to 18 games would only […]

Luke Kuechly might be the most sound tackler in all football. The Carolina Panthers star combines rare physical gifts with textbook form and innate instincts that allow him to track ballcarriers and bring them down both in a crowd and in space more reliably than perhaps any other defender in the NFL. Earlier this week, […]