Thursday Bolts – 9.23.10

Busy day for KD ahead: “Long day today..lifting, workout..then EA sports voice overs for a commercial then DEOdurant commercial..pray for me yall, thanks!”

Dwight Howard said yesterday on the Dan Patrick Show that he’d take Durant over LeBron. Trey Kerby of Ball Don’t Lie shares his thoughts: “Well, that’s a tad bit misleading as Patrick really asked who he’d rather have on his team, but it’s still interesting that an elite NBA player would choose Durant over LeBron. I mean, Durant is a great, great player and an amazing scorer, but is he really better than LeBron James, right now? Probably not. More likable? Definitely, but not the better basketball player just yet.”

Kelly Dwyer on Kevin Durant: “And with Kevin Durant? I have no idea what’s coming next. That’s why I dig him. Because a month after turning 21, he led a team that shouldn’t have had a shot at .500 ball to 50 wins last season in one of the more competitive conferences in NBA history. He dropped 30 a game last year, while hitting 47 percent of his shots, and those numbers just don’t happen for a perimeter player in today’s D-crazed NBA. And he’s 21, turns 22 in a week. And because players don’t tend to flatten out after they hit 22, how is this even going to work? If this is where he’s at 21, what will 2018 look like? What will he be doing in his prime? How are we even supposed to consider his potential, in any meaningful way? I could not care less about the Twitter-bred humility behind it all — because the Bad Taste-O-Meter has been blown to bits by LeBron and his followers, Durant could drape himself in busy t-shirts, Jay Leno appearances and NRA badges while still coming off smelling like a rose — but what I do care about is what Durant could do to the game that I’d like to think I have a handle on. And, because I’m an inveterate worrier, I wonder if this is all too much, too soon.”

A Bleacher Report article lists Grant Long as the eighth best Miami Heat player in history. In other words, we’re not talking a Boston Celtics type lineage here.

Five reasons to be excited about this Thunder season from Pat DeCola of FS Southwest. I’m not sure No. 4 is all that great: “But the question here is what to make of Jeff Green’s young career so far. Coming out of Georgetown as the fifth overall selection in the same draft as Durant burdened him with high expectations to which he has mostly filled to this point. However, his numbers regressed a bit last season in a year where his teammates around him all improved. To his credit, he did improve his field goal percentage slightly and turned the ball over less, but overall he didn’t seem to excel to the degree of his surrounding men. The 24-year old Green will be entering his fourth NBA season, a pivotal time in a basketball player’s career. Jeff Green is a fine NBA player. The question remains, however, as to what kind of NBA player he will develop into. Will he remain a 15/6/2 guy, or will he elevate his game to become an All-Star? Just another reason to watch this season.” All-Star?

Thunder signs are cool and can make you famous.

Shoals: “That’s much of the anxiety over LeBron James — we just don’t know, or think we know, what he wants out of life. The “billionaire baller” sobriquet stuck because, well, it’s the closest we’ve come to grasping what gets LBJ out of bed every morning. Durant is incandescent simply because, even if he robs a bank tomorrow, we can still count on him hiding out in a bunker with a deflated basketball and visions of shooting drills.”