The Wright Way - Straight, No Chaser #6

By: Sharone Wright
Sharone Wright was an All-state performer at Macon's Southwest high school as a McDonald's All-American. He played basketball for 3 years in the prestigious ACC conference at Clemson University where he is one of it's top 10 all-time players. Sharone was drafted 6th overall by Philadelphia in 1994 and also played for the Toronto Raptors. After 5 years in the NBA, he went to Europe as a player for 7 years and now coaches.

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Since you been goneeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!! I love that Song by Kelly Clarkson and that’s how I’m feeling today after not posting anything for a while.


See it’s been way too long. I’m sorry folks but I’m not a professional writer and my real job says that I spend lots of time coaching and scouting.

Maybe I can ask my boss to let me have some time to write since there is soo much to talk about.

I have to tell you guys that I really enjoyed the NBA All-Star game and weekend.

It never ceases to amaze me how much the NBA league office does to make this event be a hit each year. They do a good job of mixing entertainment and sports. It’s like the Oscars and a The Fish that Saved Pittsburgh all wrapped in one weekend.

I can’t say that the I'm impressed with the selection process. I'm sick and tired of guys not making the All -Star game that deserve it. It’s as if there are about 20 million idiots voting and they are only voting for the players that they either see on Sportscenter or on commercials. If they don’t see a player on ESPN then the fans know nothing about it.

That’s why I think a portion of the voting or most of it should be done by the players and coaches.

Case in point.

China has like 6789 billion people there and on any given chance, will always vote for Yao Ming.

OK, that’s cool when Yao was really balling but hey lets face it, the Great Wall hasn’t done jack crap in 3 years. And how about the fact that he didn’t even play this year and was voted a starter.

I guess they figure he might have been ready for the game? NOT!!!!!!!

How about watch the games people and do your homework. That’s what's wrong with the game.

There’s soo much voting for guys that are so called superstars even if they aren’t having superstar seasons. Tim Duncan was voted as an All -Star despite the fact that he's played like nothing this year. So why stop settling for a well known player and give that spot to NENE who has played not great this year and certainly better than Duncan.

Oh ok, you’re probably saying the Spurs have the best record. That doesn’t mean anything when this is an individual honour.

You know something is wrong when they had to force the issue to get Kevin Love on the team and this kid has like 4000 double doubles already in a first half of a season.

Incredible!!!!

Yet he had to make a rap video With Lil Wayne in order to get noticed for what he has done. Crazy crap! Lets reward these players for their games and their hard work and not their cameos appearances...

I'm venting because that’s kind of what I do well. See I have the ability to see things before they happen. Like for instance I could see the tension with Jerry Sloan and Deron Williams brewing like the Labatt’s Beer company. It was happening all of the time and it boiled over!

The reports are saying that Sloan was growing ever so pissed at Williams and vice versa. My question is why didn’t the GM and team officials step in and police the matter before it boiled over?

Maybe then we wouldn’t be where we are today and asking why a Hall of Fame coach and one of the most respected coaches of all time abruptly just quit in the middle of the season.

It's mind boggling to say the least but what is known all over the NBA is that Sloan himself isn’t always easy to get along with. So the blame can't all go towards Williams. I’ve personally talked to guys that played for Sloan on many occasions and while they all respect and admire him for his career, they all didn’t want to play for him all of the time either.

You know the story. Something like this happens and every person that has played for him starts talking about how great Sloan was and how they learned from him. But they forget to say how some of them hated him.

I know the scenario too.

Not every player will get along with a coach and vice versa but those things should stay in the locker room. That’s the NBA code of silence. Too much is leaked out these days.

The Ric Buchers and the Chris Broussards of the world pester the players too much and when they don’t get what they want, they make up things, I think.

Especially if there are problems in the locker rooms.

When I played we didn’t talk to guys in the media like this. We had leaders who ironed things out and stepped in to mash out anything that could detour our team from winning.

That’s what good leaders do.

Ever get wind of a problem in the Celtics locker room? Wonder why? It’s because the big three plus Shaq have combined years that are older than Robert Parrish and Morgan Freeman put together. Nowadays a rookie comes in to the league and 2 years later this guy is the captain wearing the C on his shirt.

That’s crazy!!

Deron is in Jersey now as we know and they say they hope to build the team around him which would be great but what if he doesn’t want to stay? What then Jersey? I know you guys think because the new owner has 3449 billion dollars (something like that) so you think its ok.

But he and Jay-z will have a Hard Knock life if they don’t get Williams to sign and score a better roster.

That’s why I love the Carmelo Anthony trade to the Knicks.

I had doubts that it would ever get done but it did only because James Dolan the owner has the cake to do it with.

Melo is one of my favorite players because he has a mentality that he can score on anyone. He has that scorer’s mindset, he brings 27 points per game and lots of rebounds to match it with Amare's 25ppg.

So you could argue that it’s on and popping but Chauncey Billups will also contribute. Some say that NYC gave up too much. Well let’s look at that. Wilson Chandler, Danilo Gallinari, Timovfey Mozgov and Raymond Felton. Three of these guys were starters yet the Knicks were a basic .500 team and not really playing that great lately.

The comparison of Felton and Billups is a wash to me but honestly Billups has soo much more playoffs experience. Gallinari has been too inconsistent to pinpoint which way is up or down with him.

Erratic shooting and no defence plague him.

Wilson Chandler is a player that I felt they should have tried to keep. He’s a very high energy defender and his offence has really come around since coming out of college. But they kept Landry Fields and he has been a steal in the draft for them.

He has been a starter all year. Great scouting will do that for ya. But when you have a chance to get a player of Melo's calibre, you have to jump on that.

He’s a once in a lifetime player. Don’t ask George Karl though. He sounded like he was glad Melo was gone in a recent interview and really made a case that he only would miss Billups and not Melo.

Saying that Melo has a personality that is hard to deal with. Woww talk about waiting until the guy leaves to throw him under the bus?

Beep beeeeep.

Seriously though Melo will be a monster in the Garden and with Amare in tow, this should be interesting once all of the Knick pieces are put on the chess board. BTW I love the way they added Corey Brewer. Talk about defence? This kid can do it. Some where I hope Glen Grunwald had some thing to do with the Knicks getting Melo. I'm also looking forward to the new LALA and Carmelo realty show. Hey it beats the hell out of watching Glee...

Baron Davis to Cleveland, Bibby to the Wizards, Mo Williams to the Clippers, Devin Harris to Utah for Deron Williams, Landry to the Hornets, Battier back to Memphis. Wowwww soo many deals that made sense and a lot of them made none. It’s like that game show Deal or no Deal. Only this time there seem to be no real prizes after Deron Williams and Melo.

The state of the NBA continues to be up for grabs. It seems that every day that the NFL gets closer to what both sides want in that league, our CBA is getting further and further away. I feel that this is not going to get it done. There must be more meetings and more attention must be paid to the demands of both sides.

My sources tell me that if it is to be done, the owners say they are not going to budge. Let’s hope the demand of the game and the fans yelling for the game that they love will halt this pending Lockout. If not, it’ll be harder to look at than those Black Mamba commercials with Kobe and Kanye West. Ouch!!

I can certainly understand some of the teams in the NBA that are losing their superstar players and getting nothing in return for them. It’s not an easy thing to see. Toronto losing Mcgrady, Carter and Bosh. Cleveland losing Lebron, Denver losing Carmelo.

The feeling now is that certain players force their way out of town and I'm not for that. But I am for the rights of the player to do what he wishes if he has played and played hard and given all that he has.

In your contract year it is your decision to make.

It was Lebron's and it was Bosh's, it was Melo's and for sure it will be Dwight Howard's and Chris Paul's very soon. Let’s not forget that this is their life and they cannot live it for fans, owners and common folk who only get to see them on the court for 2 hours a night.

This is most always a family issue and you have to do whets best for yourself and your family. The owners at the end of the day will do whets best for their teams.

Remember my blog post about the Clippers owner making fun of Baron Davis and mocking him at games? Well Davis started balling after he got healthy. And what happened then?

The Clippers trade him to the worst team in the NBA.

See what I mean about loyalty?? There is none... To some owners you’re just a piece of meat at the market.

Let’s see how things pan out with the newly structured teams.