NBA BEAT - THE NBA SEASON… IT'S ON!!!

James Loving/National Radio Text Service

The Shaq Attack has moved to Cleveland - International Players in the league - Referees Agree

Thursday October 29, 2009

LET'S GET IT ON!!!

The NBA season has begun with some notable changes. Shaquille O'Neal has taken his show to Cleveland for the purpose of as he puts it, "Get a ring for the king." The king he refers to is LeBron James who led the Cavs to the 2007 NBA finals only to disappoint and not have the muscle or poise to deal now on the Cleveland roster it is hoped that it will be enough to take them over the top and indeed bring the king a ring.

As it turns out the opening day results proved that they will have their work cut out for them as they lost to the 2008 NBA champion Boston Celtics 95-89 in Cleveland. Shaq turned in a solid performance reigning in 10 rebounds (all defensive) and scoring 10 points with 5-11 shooting in his 29 minutes of duty.

The one thing that Cleveland qualifies as is tall. Their starting center for the decade has been the often injured Zydrunas Ilgauskas. The 11 year NBA veteran stands taller than the 7'1" O'Neal at 7'3." The Lithuanian split the time at center with O'Neal playing 25 minutes scoring six points and took in 5 rebounds. Brazilian forward Anderson Varajao is 6'10." Le Bron James scored 38 points of his 45 minutes on the floor. He took in only four rebounds down from his career 6.6 average. That is where the addition of O'Neal may factor in James' overall production whereas he can save his strength going for rebounds and more energy to attack offensively.

The Celtics have a new man on the roster with Rasheed Wallace entering the fold. Wallace adds some offense to the squad as well as some attitude. Wallace knows how to win as he was a member of the 2004 Detroit Piston title winning team. He has a career average of 15 points per game and 7 rebounds per game. The Celtics are and over 30 aged team with Wallace 35, Kevin Garnett 33, Ray Allen 34, Paul Pierce 32 and reserve Eddie house 31 in that category.

The question is will Shaq and these over 30 Celtics have enough energy at the end of the season when the real season begins in the playoffs to win a title or… will they be TOO POOPED TO POP?

83 INTERNATIONAL PLAYERS

The start of the 2009-10 NBA season will mark 83 international players from 36 countries and territories on official rosters (active and inactive), matching the record of international players on opening night rosters (2006-07). Twenty-seven of the 30 teams have at least one international player.

The Milwaukee Bucks roster features the most international players with seven. The Charlotte Bobcats, Sacramento Kings and Toronto Raptors each feature five international players. Omri Casspi (Israel) of the Sacramento Kings, Jonas Jerebko (Sweden) of the Detroit Pistons, and Hasheem Thabeet (Tanzania) of the Memphis Grizzlies are representing their countries for the first time on an NBA roster. France has the strongest representation with a record 10 players.

At the end of the 2008-09 regular season, the NBA featured 77 international players from 33 countries and territories on team rosters (both active and inactive). In comparison, the NBA had 36 international players from 24 countries and territories in 1999-2000.

REFEREES ASSOCIATION APPROVE TWO-YEAR COLLECTIVE BARGAINING AGREEMENT

The NBA and the National Basketball Referees Association announced last week that they entered into a new two-year labor agreement. The agreement, which will cover the 2009-10 and 2010-11 seasons, ends the lockout of referees that commenced on September 18.

“We are pleased to reach this agreement,” NBA Commissioner David Stern said. “The negotiations extended further than either side had hoped, but when our regular season tips off on Tuesday we’ll have the best referees in the world officiating our games. We appreciate the job done by our replacement officials during the preseason.”

Per league policy, terms of the agreement will not be disclosed.

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