You too will believe white men can fly. Or hover slightly.
Many thanks to Basketbawful reader Brad C. for today's pic.

The Philadelphia 76ers: Unlike the Memphis Grizzlies, the Sixers haven't enjoyed a post-Iverson bounce. Last night's 112-92 drubbing in Atlanta was Philly's fourth loss in a row and seventh in their last nine games. The Sixers gave up 23 points off 18 turnovers, got outrebounded 47-32, and were outscored in the paint 56-38. Andre "80 Million Dollar Man #1" Iguodala committed a game-high 6 turnovers and finished with only 11 points on 5-for-12 shooting. Elton "80 Million Dollar Man #2" Brand didn't play.

The Gol_en State Warriors: Who doesn't love playing a Nellie team? Orlando shot 52 percent, had 70 points in the paint, were +29 on the boards and finished with 117 points in a 27-point victory.

Said Magic coach Stan Van Gundy Ron Jeremy: "The game went as it should."

This game was so effort-free that Dwight Howard didn't commit a foul for the first time since December 12, 2008.

Said Pumaman: "I think that's a world record. I think that the guy from Guinness was here tonight."

In all fairness, the Warriors were missing leading scorer Monta Ellis (strained lower back), Andris Biedrins (sports hernia), Corey Maggette (strained left hamstring) and Vladimir Radmanovic (sore right Achilles'). Gol_en State had to go with their 35th starting lineup of the season, which lead led Don Nelson to name himself "D-League Coach of the Year."

Nellie must read Basketbawful.

The Charlotte Bobcats: The shillelagh I expected the Celtics to drop on the Pistons on Tuesday night? It got dropped on the Bobcats instead. Charlotte shot 36 percent (compared to almost 54 percent for Boston) and went 0-for-9 from downtown in last night's 104-90 loss. This was the third time this season the Celtics blasted the Bobcats by at least 15 points. They won 92-59 -- Charlotte's lowest point total of the season -- at home on opening night, and then 108-90 in Charlotte on December 1.

Said Charlotte coach Larry Brown: "I don't buy all this stuff that they're in trouble." Speaking of being in trouble, the 'Cats have now lost five of their last six games.

The Boston Celtics: According to the AP game recap: "The Celtics, winners of their last two, have the second-lowest home winning percentage -- .607 -- of the top eight teams in the Eastern Conference. Only the Miami Heat, currently holding on to the eighth playoff spot in the conference, have a lower percentage at home."

Homecourt fail.

Said Paul Pierce: "If we just played a little better at home, we probably would have the best record in the league from the way we have been playing on the road." Let the excuses begin!

The Detroit Pistons: One night after hanging with the Celtics, the Pistons had a chance to go against a fellow sub-.500 team.

And they got crushed.

This was a classic stat padder. The Bricks scored 128 points on 55 percent shooting. David Lee just missed a triple-double (21 points, 18 rebounds, 8 assists), Knee-Mac had a throwback game (21 points, 7 boards, 8 assists) and Bill Walker -- who was little more than a human victory cigar for the Celtics -- scored a career-high 22 points.

Said Detroit coach John Kuester: "We lost our edge tonight, there's no question about it, and I was disappointed, because we've been playing some pretty good basketball up until tonight. And give them credit, they made shots. We did not play with the type of intensity we have in the past."

Joe Dumars: We can go ahead and admit without hesitation that spending $90+ million on Ben Gordon and Charlie Villanueva last summer was a horrifying and (if you're a Pistons fan) borderline unforgivable mistake, right? Especially in the wake of trading Chauncey Billups (who has helped transform the Nuggets into an "almost" team) for The Cancer.

And man, you know you've screwed up pretty bad when a team as downtrodden and dysfunctional as the Bricks are using your moves as a template for how not to run a team.

Said New York coach Mike 'Antoni: "I don't want to point them out, but we don't want to get stuck in mediocrity and we could have done that. We could've put a Band-Aid on some holes and be more competitive and right now that seems like a good idea, even to me, because we have to go through this. But this summer would not have been a good idea."

You know, if Dumars had simply held onto that cash, the Pistons could have been in the market for 'Bron, Wade, Bosh and the rest. Instead he made it rain like Pacman and the Pistons are 21-40.

James Posey: The Grizzlies' Mike Conley scored 9 of his season-high 26 points in the fourth quarter, but he shanked two free throws with 10.7 seconds left that gave the Hornets a chance to tie or win game. No matter. Rudy Gay intercepted James Posey's pass intended for Marcus Thornton and threw down an exclamation point dunk at the buzzer. The final score: Memphis 104, New Orleans 100.

Said Posey: "I got the rebound -- no timeouts -- so I was pushing the ball up. When I got there I thought I was going to have a throw-back to Marcus and Rudy intercepted it. You wish you could have got a shot. We didn't. In that case we still had a chance to win the game and I turned the ball over. ... We weren't able to pull this one out and that hurts."

No kidding. The Grizzlies' franchise record fifth straight road win was the Hornets' third loss in a row and their fifth in the last six games. New Orleans began the night four games behind the Frail Blazers for the eighth and final playoff spot out West. Now they're in the 10th spot...a half-game behind the Grizzlies.

The Chicago Bulls: Don't get me wrong. Trading John Salmons was the right move. They needed to clear his salary off the books for their run at a big name free agent this summer. But trading the Fish Man to a playoff rival is, uhm, backfiring.

Salmons scored 16 of his 22 points in the second half of Milwaukee's 100-87 win over the Wizards Generals Bullets. And even though he acted like he was sucking on a lemon after the game, Bucks coach Scott Skiles noted Salmons' production: "We got a win tonight. We're happy, we'll take it, but we took an overall step back. Our overall intensity wasn't what it needs to be. We needed multiple guys to try and step up and help us and we got that. John was big."

As someone who has followed Skiles' coaching career pretty closely, I can tell you that a statement as simple as "John was big" is huge praise from a man who probably wouldn't even crack a smile if his own child was elected President.

Anyway, Salmons is averaging 20.4 points and has scored in double figures in all eight games he's played for the Bucks. Milwaukee is 7-1 in those games...and Salmons has only practiced with the team once! What is this, pickup basketball?

Said Andy Bogut: "Practice, who needs practice? He's been huge for us, no question."

No talking about practice please.

The New Jersey Nyets: The comic tragedy of the 2009-10 New Jersy Nyets continued with a 111-92 homecourt blowout to the Craboliers. The Nyetes fell behind 35-15 after 12 minutes of lacktion...and the game was essentially over. The only drama after that was when the New Jersey crowd booed King Crab for flushing home a couple soft dunks instead of rocking the rim.

Said 'Bron: "I guess that's how much they love you when they boo you."

I'm sensing he's a bit of a bitch. Or is it just me?

Rookie Terrence Williams -- who scored a career-high 21 points for the Nyets -- said: "When you fall behind 20 against the best team in the NBA, face it, it's going to be tough." Especially when you're the worst team in the NBA. And maybe the worst team ever.

The Minnesota Timberwolves: A lot of nights, scoring 109 points on 53+ percent shooting might have resulted in a win. But not for the Al Jefferson-less Timberpoops, who disimproved their Western Conference worst record to 14-48 in a four-point loss to the Jason Kidd-less Mavs in Dallas.

Said Minny coach Kurt Rambis: "We made some silly mistakes, which has been the hallmark of our team." Way to pump the troops up, Kurt! But whose silly mistakes are you talking about? After all, Dallas went on a 22-6 run after Rambis was called for a technical foul early in the second quarter. That spurt gave Dallas its largest lead (54-41). As always, I'm just sayin'.

Shawn Marion, unintentionally dirty quote machine: "They are a spunky team. We had them on their heels and we should have put them on their backs."

The Houston Rockets: Revenge game! Former Rocket Carl Landry lit up his old team for 22 points and 10 rebounds while Kevin Martin -- the dude he was traded for -- went 3-for-13 from the field. The result was an 84-81 home loss to the Excremento Kings.

In related news, Houston has lost five of seven since the trade.

The best part is that Landry -- who got a standing ovation and a "Landry! Landry!" chant from the crowd before tipoff -- sealed the deal. The Rockets had pulled to within 82-81 with six seconds left, and Shane Battier fouled Landry with four seconds left. Landry swished both 'throws.

Said Landry: "I wanted to hit those free throws. It was just a sigh of relief, I was so happy."

Go Boilers!

The Oklahoma City Thunder: The Thunder's 119-90 loss to the Nuggets in Denver should be a pretty good indicator that -- as good as this team has been this season -- they're probably a first round exit waiting to happen. No shame in that. They're a young team on the rise. But the spanking still smarted a bit.

Not only was this OKC's worst loss of the season, it was their biggest defeat since a 30-point whupping by the Frail Blazers last April.

Said Kevin Durant: "This is a wake-up game. You are going to have games like this. You have think about what we did, move on and make the adjustments we need to make for our next game. It's just a bump in the road. A minor setback."

Uh huh.

The Indiana Pacers: Last night, BadDave and I were watching games from the very awesome Tilted Kilt in downtown Chicago. At one point, the ticker flashed that the Pacers were ahead 18-11. BadDave laughed and said, "That's the last lead we're gonna see." Sure enough, Indy lost 102-79.

Said Roy Hibbert: "We didn't play as a team is the only thing I can say. We've been trying to figure it out all year." I think he meant to say "for years."

The Los Angeles Clippers: Who are these guys? Who we thought they were.

No, my friends. They are not surging.

The Other L.A. Team got outscored 39-18 in the third quarter on their way to a 127-101 loss. As a result, Phoenix completed a four-game season series sweep of the Clips for the second straight year. What's more, the Clippers haven't beaten the Suns since January 15, 2008. The Other L.A. Team is 3-13 against The Phoenix Team since losing Game 7 of the 2006 Western Conference semifinals.

Oh, and this was the Clips' eighth loss this season by 20 or more points.

Said Chris Kaveman: "I don't know why we did do poorly tonight. We came in feeling confident. It was a good first half and we remained close. After halftime, it all went downhill. Tonight was just not our night." How can the Clippers ever come into a game feeling confident? A death row inmate who's already strapped into the electric chair has a better chance of coming back than the Clippers.

Amar''''''e Stoudemire, quote machine: Regarding Channing Frye, who scored 23 points and drilled four three-pointers in a 2:37 stretch of the fourth quarter, STAT said: "That was great. We had fun watching him tee off. Once he gets hot, it's hard to turn him off. And tonight he had it going." I don't know why, but the "it's hard to turn him off" part just cracked me up. Again, it's probably just me.

Update! Mascot fail: Sweet Lincoln's mullet, this is awesome. If you ever see me doing anything at any time other than watching this clip, it's not me. Run for your lives. [Thanks to chris for the link.]


Lacktion report: Somehow, chris managed to type up some lacktion while scrambling back on the Purple Pauper Bandwagon Express. Choo, choo!!

Warriors-Magic: Chris Hunter negated two field goals in 19:08 and two boards by fouling out with two turnovers for an 8:6 Voskuhl. For Orlando, Anthony Johnson fouled once and lost the rock once for a +2 suck differential in 4:48.

Pistons-Knicks: In a surprising moment of celebration, Toney Douglas jabbed at a piece of masonry for a +1 in 2:49.

Bullets-Bucks: Fabricio Oberto continues to aim for the vacated spot of top Bullets lacktator, notching a foul and turnover in 6:01 for a +2 that doubled as a 2:0 Voskuhl. For Milwaukee, Royal Ivey crowned himself a foul for a +1 in 1:32, while Primoz Brezec had the same exact statline in 1:27 that also doubled as a 1:0 Madsen-level Voskuhl!

Kings-Rockets: Garrett Temple's moved from the confines of Clutch the Bear's home to Houston's opponent tonight, the Purple Paupers - and somehow found himself as Pauly W's human victory cigar, while focused firmly on New Super Mario Bros. for the DS! Garrett garnered a mere four seconds in his Kings debut, enough for the Super Mario!!!!!

Meanwhile, Chuck Hayes countered a made field goal and board in 16:49 with four fouls and a giveaway for a 5:3 Voskuhl.

Pacers-Frail Blazers: Jeff Pendergraph wired himself a money order worth 4.1 trillion (4:05) while fellow Portlander Patrick Mills processed a trio of missed shots and a foul in 5:38 for a +4!

Suns-Clippers: Jarron Collins tossed a brick in 3:28 for a +1, while Steve Novak superbly returned to the floor for a full TWELVE minutes of lacktion, fouling once and tossing three misses from Grand Central Market for a sucktacular +4!

Labels: But dinosaurs can't skate - no wonder they're extinct, white men can fly, Worst of the Night