Cleveland Cavaliers Blog – Page 74 – NBA Blog

LeBron, Wade, Melo, CP3 set up 4-game Homecoming Tour

LeBron James, Chris Paul, Dwyane Wade and Carmelo Anthony are going home — and bringing friends with them.

With no end to the NBA lockout in sight, the All-Star group is set to lead a four-game “Homecoming Tour,” starting with a matchup in James’ hometown of Akron, Ohio on Dec. 1, followed by a Dec. 4 game in New Orleans, a Dec. 7 game in Chicago and culminating with a Dec. 10 contest in East Rutherford, N.J.

James, Paul, Wade and Anthony are committed to play in all four games of the tour, which was announced early Monday. Proceeds from the tour — which will include events such as food drives, educational outreach programs and clinics in each city — will benefit the four headlining players’ charitable foundations, and tour sponsor Google Plus will stream each game live.

“It’ll be very neat,” Wade told The Associated Press. “First of all, this is something we talked about doing a long time ago as players. To have an opportunity to go to these different cities that we’re from, to bring basketball to them at a high level and also have a charitable component in each city and to be with the guys, it’ll be cool. It’s something we’re looking forward to.”

Tickets for the first three games go on sale Tuesday. Tickets for the East Rutherford game will be on sale Wednesday.

— Reported by the Associated Press

James, Wade and Bosh had initially been listed to participate in a world tour of NBA stars, which also was to include Paul and Anthony. That tour was to include stops in Puerto Rico, London, Macau and Australia before it was cancelled.

“It’s not anything that I’ve heard about since then,” Wade said, with the change of plans to a domestic tour. “I was excited about the opportunity to go, obviously to play basketball with some of my friends, some of the best players in the game, to travel to different places and given them kind of what we get over here, the excitement of the game. It’s unfortunate.”

Instead, the passports are off and the domestic games are on.

“You could see, I was there to the end,” Wade said. “I wasn’t going to pull out of it, I was going to keep going and I wanted to play.”

— Reported by Ira Winderman of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Shaq rejected entrance by NYC club

Shaquille O’Neal couldn’t power his way through the lane at a New York nightclub this weekend — getting TURNED AWAY at the door … all because he was dressed like a lumberjack.

TMZ has learned … Shaq rolled up to nightclub/restaurant Mars 2112 on Saturday night wearing jeans, a sweatshirt, tennis shoes and a beanie (pictured above with random fan later that night).

But according to the club promoter, Mike Mogul, Shaq’s attire wasn’t up to club standards … so security politely informed the retired NBA star that he would not be allowed inside.

— Reported by TMZ

Judge dismisses lawsuit against Allen Iverson over Detroit bar fight

A judge has dismissed a lawsuit against former NBA star and Detroit Piston Allen Iverson over a 2009 bar fight.

The Detroit News reports Tuesday that federal Judge Nancy Edmunds found no evidence that Iverson punched an Ohio man or that the man who struck him was linked to the player.

Lawyer Michael Cafferty said Iverson feels vindicated. Guy Walker plans to appeal.

— Reported by the Associated Press

LeBron, Durant set up flag football game

According to a Thursday afternoon post on James’ Twitter feed, the Miami Heat forward will be teaming up with Oklahoma City Thunder forward Kevin Durant to host a flag football game on Nov. 30.

“Its all set people!” James wrote. “Nov.30th Team @Kingjames vs Team @KDTrey5 in Flag football. Its going down. Can’t wait.”

It’s not known where the game will be held, and it’s also unclear exactly who else will be participating, but you can bet it’ll be a star-studded cast.

The players’ announcement that a game will be played is hardly a surprise, however, as both have been testing out their football chops while the labor crisis gets resolved.

— Reported by Sam Gardner of Fox Sports Florida

Shaq book places blame on Mitch Kupchak

O’Neal speaks of Kupchak in only six pages of the 281-page “Shaq Uncut: My Story,” co-written by Jackie MacMullan, slated for a Nov. 15 release. But that’s enough prose to label Kupchak as the main culprit behind Shaq’s hasty departure from the Lakers.

According to the book, Kupchak promised to grant Shaq a contract extension following the 2003-04 season and not to discuss their contract negotiations publicly. Once the 2003-04 season ended, however, O’Neal was disturbed by an apparent interview in which Kupchak revealed the Lakers’ plan to hold onto Bryant while keeping their options open with O’Neal.

“That was it. That was the end of me in a Lakers uniform. Mitch broke our agreement. How could I trust him again?” Shaq writes in the book. “For months, I kept waiting for Mitch to come to me and say, ‘Shaq, you’re getting older, we need some new players. Mr. Buss doesn’t want to pay you and Kobe doesn’t want you here.’ But that conversation never happened. So that was when I demanded a trade. I couldn’t trust Mitch anymore and it was clear Kobe was now the one with all the power.”

— Reported by Mark Medina of the Los Angeles Times Blog

Shaq sues former IT employee over selling of personal emails

Shaquille O’Neal is suing a former information technology employee the former NBA great claims invaded his privacy by selling personal emails that damaged his reputation.

The lawsuit was filed against Shawn Darling in Miami-Dade Circuit Court. It seeks an injunction barring Darling from providing O’Neal’s emails to anyone, unspecified damages and the return of all O’Neal’s private electronic messages.

O’Neal paid Darling up to $150 an hour for IT work.

— Reported by the Associated Press

Shaq once went off on teammate Glen Davis

From Shaquille O’Neal’s upcoming autobiography:

“Big Baby” Davis kept looking me off and taking it himself. Doc is shouting at him to go inside, but he won’t. So Doc calls timeout and draws up a play for me. I go out there, and I back Andrew Bynum way under the rim. I’m loose, I’m ready. I’ve got Bynum under the basket and again, Baby won’t give me the ball. So I go up to him and say, “If you ever miss me again I’m going to punch you in the face.” I was hot.

Two nights later we’re playing in Sacramento and here we go again. I take three shots the entire game and again I’ve got my man isolated underneath the basket, and Baby ignores me and takes a jump shot. So the next time we’re in the huddle I let Baby have it.

I tell him, “Pass the [expletive] ball inside.” He comes back at me a little bit and now I’m really heated. All hell is breaking loose. We’re going back and forth. Doc is standing there and he’s not saying a word. The message is pretty clear: Work this out yourselves. I tell Baby, “You’re a selfish player. Everyone on this team knows it.” Hey, all the fans knew it. He takes shots when he shouldn’t.

— Reported by Julian Benbow of the Boston Globe

Cavs forward Christian Eyenga to play in Spain during lockout

Christian Eyenga has become the second Cavalier to sign with an overseas club during the NBA lockout. A third Cav could be right behind him.

Eyenga agreed to a deal with the Spanish side Joventut Badalona, according to a tweet from his agent Andy Miller. The swingman can return to the Cavaliers once the NBA work stoppage ends. He was playing in Spain before the Cavs signed him last season.

The Congolese international played in 44 games last season with the Cavs, averaging 6.9 points and 2.8 rebounds.

— Reported by Tom Reed of the Cleveland Plain Dealer

LeBron, Melo, CP3 will not play in NBA world lockout tour

The proposed world tour of NBA elite amid the league’s lockout won’t include at least one of the Miami Heat’s Big Three.

LeBron James, whose name had been thrown into the mix for the two-week tour that opens Sunday in Puerto Rico and is scheduled to then include stops in London, Macau and Australia, will not be among the participants.

A source close to the Heat forward Wednesday told the Sun Sentinel that James had never committed to the tour and added that James is not participating, “due to previous commitments.”

…

In the wake of the Sun Sentinel being informed of James not joining the tour, ESPN reported that New York Knicks forward Carmelo Anthony and New Orleans Hornets guard Chris Paul also would not be participating. With Wade close to those two, his interest could also be waning.

— Reported by Ira Winderman of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Mike Brown will use Lakers assistants differently than Phil Jackson did

Brown plans to handle his coaching staff differently than former coach Phil Jackson. Jackson assigned specific scouting responsibilities to his four assistants, Brian Shaw, Jim Cleamons, Frank Hamblen and Chuck Person. Brown said at a recent appearance for the release of the video game NBA2K12 that he plans to have all of his assistants, including Person, John Kuester, Quin Snyder and Ettore Messina, coach in all phases of the game.

“Our guys need to hear my voice quite a bit,” Brown said. “I’ll lead the charge in a lot of areas on both ends of the floor. But I’m not one to have my coaches sit back and do nothing. They have to get out there and work. I don’t care what side of the ball we’re on. I don’t care what we’re teaching at that particular time. They’re all coaches. None of them are specialists. They can all coach at both ends of the floor.”

— Reported by Mark Medina of the Los Angeles Times Blog