The New, New Jersey Nets Owner

KEY STATS

-Net Worth: $9.5 Billion
-Fortune: Self Made 
-Primary Source: Investments (Commodities/Mining)
-Age: 44
-Country: Russia
-Education: Bachelors (International Finance) Moscow Finance Institute

FUN FACTS

-He's the Wealthiest Russian and #40 in the World
-He's 6'8''
-Former owner of Moscow basketball team that won the European               Championship
-Made 10 Billion after being forced urged to sell his share of Norilsk                           Nickel in 2007 following his prostitute scandal (never charged) after                     acquiring the company in 1993 for a"pennies on the dollar" amount of                         about 200 million (the same price tag for the Nets).

Caron Butler...He's on a Horse

The Mavs are now the biggest threat to the Lakers in the West partly due to the acquisition of this guy:

Carmelo Fitting with Stylist

Complex interviews Melo and his Stylist while getting fitted for a suit in his hotel in NYC, he won't wear a bowtie but loves ascotts, go figure...full interview at Complex.

25% off at Champs, Footaction and Footlocker - 3/25 - 3/28

 

Use Below Codes at Checkout:

Champs - FFMR6325

Footaction - FFMRA325

Footlocker - FFMR3258

Exceptions: Certificate cannot be used in outlet stores or in conjunction with any other coupon or discount offer, associate benefit, VIP Platinum Rewards Cards, stock locator, bulk purchases (more than five pairs/units of the same SKU), multiple offers, prior purchases or purchase of a gift card.

Antoine Walker Explains How He Went Broke

Outside the Lines piece on how Antoine Walker who made $110 million over his NBA career and now isstruggling to keep his head above water.  He's playing pro ball in Puerto Rico but will only receive his Cash On Delivery of a Championship.  Here are more athletes who financially fell from grace.

Top 5 Buzzer-Beating-Game-Winning-Dunks

Top 5 Game Winning Deciding and Buzzer Beating Dunks

5. Eddy Curry, Spike and Denzel

4. Vince on the Rockets

3. Josh Smith vs Houston

2. Josh Smith vs Magic

1. Dwight on the Spurs

Kicking Knowledge

Inspired by that new Miller Lite commercial. Knowledge is power.

 

The Most Interesting Man in the World is Back

Here's the new Most Interesting Man in the World commercials for Dos Equis.

But first, here are my Top 5 Lines From Dos Equis Most Interesting Man Commercials
5. He has been known to cure narcolepsy, just by walking into the room.
4. The police often question him, just because they find him interesting.
3. He lives his life vicariously through himself.
2. He has never lost a sock.
1. He can speak Italian, in French.

What If?

Interesting Draft day stories from Bulls.com that changed Bulls, Lakers and Celtics history.

In 1979, the Bulls had the No. 2 overall pick, but missed out on Larry Bird because Boston took advantage of a then league rule by selecting Bird in June of 1978, a full year before he left Indiana State University. 

A lost coin flip in 1979 was the only reason Magic Johnson didn’t pack his bags for Chicago.  Because they called 'Heads' instead of 'Tails' they ended up with All-American forward David Greenwood out of UCLA.

Karl Malone was available to the Bulls in 1985, but Chicago picked Memphis State’s Kevin Lee, who was later traded for Charles Oakley.

March Madness - 64 Most Stylish College Players Ever

Check out GQ's March Madness inspired Bracket of the 64 Most Stylish College Basketball Players of All Time, with Regions replaced with era's.  See the list here.

Footlocker Bracketology Give-Away

Vote on your favorite kick from old school to new school and be entered for a chance to win free kicks for a year!

To enter the giveaway you have to either vote online at http://lockermadness.footlocker.com, visit a Foot Locker retail location, or text your choice to LOCKER (562537) using the codes on the site between 12:00 a.m. ET on March 11, 2010 and 11:59 p.m. ET on April 5, 2010.

For the official rules, make sure you visit http://lockermadness.footlocker.com/rules.

Dunk-O-Meter

Below are the dunk stats so far for this year, with some commentary by some of the dunk results that stand out. Check out the running tally of every dunk this year here.

Rank    Player    Pos    Team    Dunks 
1    Dwight Howard    C    ORL    159
6    LeBron James    SF    CLE    105 
10    Kevin Durant    SF    OKC    101 - Higher than I thought
11    Dwyane Wade    SG    MIA    94
41    Carmelo Anthony    SF    DEN    48
62    Shannon Brown    PG    LAL    35 - Highest for a Point Guard
66    Kobe Bryant    SG    LAL    34 - Lower than I thought
86    J.R. Smith    SG    DEN    28
88    O.J. Mayo    SG    MEM    27 - Higher than I thought
90    Lamar Odom    PF    LAL    27
116    Derrick Rose    PG    CHI    21 - Beast
119    Dirk Nowitzki    PF    DAL    20
121    Vince Carter    SG    ORL    19 - Too many threes
123    Channing Frye    C    PHO    19 - 139 threes made
165    Grant Hill    SF    PHO    12 - Fresh Legs, he missed like 6 years
171    Brandon Roy    SG    POR    12 - Lower than I thought
179    Delonte West    SG    CLE    11
190    Rasheed Wallace    PF    BOS    10 - Way Higher than I thought
199    Ronnie Price    PG    UTA    9 - He can take the throne from Nate
201    Jonny Flynn    PG    MIN    8
226    Rashard Lewis    PF    ORL    5 - Shame, Shame, Shame
252    Glen Davis    PF    BOS    3 - Didn't know he could dunk
265    Nate Robinson    PG    BOS    3 - You're better than that!
287    Zach Randolph    PF    MEM    2 - Z-bo!!!
297    Anthony Carter    PG    DEN    1 - Need to see the footage
323    Darko Milicic    C    MIN    1 - Need to see the footage
324    Andre Miller    PG    POR    1 - Need to see the footage

The Dunk-O-Meter

Below are the dunk stats so far for this year, with some commentary by some of the dunk results that stand out. Check out the running tally of every dunk this year here.

Rank    Player    Pos    Team    Dunks 
1    Dwight Howard    C    ORL    159
6    LeBron James    SF    CLE    105 
10    Kevin Durant    SF    OKC    101 - Higher than I thought
11    Dwyane Wade    SG    MIA    94
37    Pau Gasol    PF    LAL    50
41    Carmelo Anthony    SF    DEN    48
51    Kevin Garnett    PF    BOS    40
62    Shannon Brown    PG    LAL    35 - Highest for a Point Guard
66    Kobe Bryant    SG    LAL    34 - Lower than I thought
86    J.R. Smith    SG    DEN    28
88    O.J. Mayo    SG    MEM    27 - Higher than I thought
90    Lamar Odom    PF    LAL    27
101    Tim Duncan    PF    SA    24
116    Derrick Rose    PG    CHI    21 - Beast
119    Dirk Nowitzki    PF    DAL    20
121    Vince Carter    SG    ORL    19 - Too many threes
122    Tyreke Evans    PG    SAC    19 - *Shooting Guard Body
123    Channing Frye    C    PHO    19 - 139 threes made
165    Grant Hill    SF    PHO    12 - Fresh Legs, he missed like 6 years
171    Brandon Roy    SG    POR    12 - Lower than I thought
179    Delonte West    SG    CLE    11
190    Rasheed Wallace    PF    BOS    10 - Way Higher than I thought
199    Ronnie Price    PG    UTA    9 - He can take the throne from Nate
201    Jonny Flynn    PG    MIN    8
226    Rashard Lewis    PF    ORL    5 - Shame, Shame, Shame
242    Antawn Jamison    PF    CLE    4 - Those half t-shirts must be effecting him
252    Glen Davis    PF    BOS    3 - Didn't know he could dunk
265    Nate Robinson    PG    BOS    3 - You're better than that!
277    Ben Gordon    SG    DET    2
287    Zach Randolph    PF    MEM    2 - Z-bo!!!
297    Anthony Carter    PG    DEN    1 - Need to see the footage
323    Darko Milicic    C    MIN    1 - Need to see the footage
324    Andre Miller    PG    POR    1 - Need to see the footage

Money to Burn: Costly pro athlete screw-ups

According to Sports Illustrated almost 80 percent of NFL players are flirting with bankruptcy 2 years after they retire, and 60 percent of NBA players end up broke within 5 years of retirement.

Here is a list of athletes that have lost their fortunes through some of the biggest financial blunders of all time.

Scottie Pippen - Former Bulls star Scottie Pippen lost $120 million in career earnings due to poor financial planning and bad business ideas. Pip blew $27 million on bad investments and spent $4.3 million on a Gulfstream II corporate jet.

Evander Holyfield - Real Deal Holyfield reportedly made over $250 million in cash during his boxing career, but despite this he reportedly is flat broke. Holyfield spent $20 million on a 54,000 sq foot, 109 room house on 235 acres! You could buy a Range Rover with the electric bill payment alone.

Lenny Dykstra - The former Phillies star failed businesses include car washes, a magazine company, real estate investing and a stock trading website. According to Dykstra’s July 2009 bankruptcy filing, he owed more than $30 million to creditors, including his $18.5 million purchase of Wayne Gretzky’s home.

Latrell Sprewell - He famously turned down a $21 million contract because he said it wasn’t enough money to feed his family. Sprewell, who made over $96 million during his career, lost his $1.5 million dollar Italian yacht, named “Milwaukee’s Best”, in 2007. According to MSNBC, a U.S. marshal seized the yacht after Sprewell defaulted on his mortgage. His $5.4 million house went into foreclosure in May 2008.

Mike Tyson - The king of them all is boxer Mike Tyson, who squandered a $350 million to $400 million dollar fortune. So what did “Iron” Mike spend his fortune on? He spent over $4.5 million dollars on cars alone. Throw in a $2 million dollar bathtub and $140,000 for two Bengal tigers and you can see why Tyson’s fortune is down for the count. He filed for bankruptcy in 2003.

See full article (here). 

Hurricane Season

I just checked out Hurricane Season, a movie based on real events, amid the wreckage of Hurricane Katrina, where a Louisiana high school basketball coach pulls together a team of kids from previously rival schools and leads them to the state finals. Stars: Forest Whitaker, Bow Wow, Isaiah Washington, Lil Wayne and Taraji P. Henson.

Now this movie was filmed in 2007-2008 and was supposed to be released in theaters last year but it got shelved. It received the Steven Seagal treatment and was released straight to DVD a few months back, reasons cited are financial issues at the Weinstein Studio and lack of creativity of the script. Shame it was actually a pretty good basketball movie, the best I've seen since He Got Game (1998).

*Honorable Mention: Love&Basketball (2000), Like Mike (seriously) (2002)

Where are they now? Juan Dixon

Watching the Wizards put it on Celtics right now, and I just thought whatever happened to Juan Dixon?  He left the University of Maryland as their all-time leading scorer and was drafted by the Wizards in 2002. His story was somewhat interesting both parents were heroin users and both died of AIDS when he was a teen.  He was also undersized and I usually root for the little man.   Well I guess he was too little, after not making the Hawks squad he joined a team in Spain but last month tested positive for anabolic steroids.  His status is currently unclear, shame.