Below is the exclusive interview with The Players’ Tribune:

The post Video: DeAndre Jordan speaks on Clippers-Mavs free-agency drama appeared first on Perfect Pick'em.

“First of all, it’s never happened before that a division winner did not finish within the top eight, and our basketball analytics folks calculate that there’s less than a 5 percent chance that it would happen.”

“Where we are leaning right now is that we would not guarantee a spot for a division winner in part because it’s so unlikely to happen, and No. 2 if it does happen it would be potentially confusing to fans. No. 3, you would be displacing a team that did have a top-eight record.”

“So while we’re going to continue to discuss it a little bit more — we need to make a decision before the preseason begins — I think the greater likelihood is we will not be guaranteeing a spot to a division winner.”

So, while a division title may give a team another banner to raise in the rafters, it may mean little else in the larger scheme of the NBA Playoffs.

The post NBA Playoffs may not be guaranteed to division winners appeared first on Perfect Pick'em.

FIBA announced that Michael Jordan will be inducted into the FIBA Hall of Fame. Jordan won two Olympic gold medals in his illustrious career, once in 1984 and in 1992 as part of the Dream Team.

Michael Jordan, arguably the greatest player of all-time, headlines a list of nine world class basketball personalities from seven different countries that make up the 2015 Class of Inductees to be enshrined into FIBA’s Hall of Fame on Saturday 19 September.

The remaining honorees include:

• Sarunas Marciulionis (Lithuania)
• Anne Donovan (U.S.)
• Vladimir Tkachenko (Russia/Ukraine)
• Ruperto Herrera Tabio (Cuba)
• Antoine Rigaudeau (France)
• Jan Stirling (Australia)
• Robert Blanchard (France)
• Noah Klieger (Israel)

The post Michael Jordan will be inducted into the FIBA Hall of Fame appeared first on Perfect Pick'em.

The Nuggets will receive Nick Johnson, Kostas Papanikolaou, Pablo Prigioni and Joey Dorsey along a lottery protected first-round pick in 2016 and cash considerations. Houston will also receive a 2017 second-round pick in the deal.

Lawson was a first-round pick by the Minnesota Timberwolves in 2009 before being traded to Denver on draft day. He has averaged 14.2 points and 6.6 assists in his six-year career. However his trade stock plummeted after being arrested for DUI for the third time, bringing along a high-risk/high-reward factor to his new team.

Rockets GM Daryl Morey believes Lawson’s upside is worth the risk, and he will help as a secondary scorer to take some of the load off James Harden, who led the team in scoring and assists last season.

“He’s one of the best playmakers in the league,” Morey said of Lawson. “We struggled against teams that would really load up on James and we feel like that will be a lot more difficult for teams to do that now.”

The post Nuggets trade Ty Lawson to Houston Rockets appeared first on Perfect Pick'em.

The San Antonio Spurs hired Hammon as the first female full-time assistant coach in NBA history. She was also selected to coach the team’s summer league squad in Las Vegas.

The SummerSpurs went 6-1 in the league, only losing the opener to the New York Knicks and then posting six straight wins.

In an interview with NBATV, Hammon stated:

“It was a grind. They’ve been together for 17 days. They really started to jell the last two or three games. They listened, and they played really hard for me. I just really appreciate their attentiveness and alertness. They were tired, but they fought through. So all the credit really goes to them.”

Not a bad way to start.

The post Becky Hammon leads Spurs to Summer League Championship appeared first on Perfect Pick'em.