D-League Referee Kevin Cutler Called Up To The NBA
At 6-foot-8 and 270 pounds, former Long Beach State player Kevin Cutler (1989-91) became the tallest and heaviest referee ever to work an NBA game last season.
He was called up during the middle of it from the NBA Developmental League and wound up appearing in seven games.
Well, Cutler must have made an admirable impression, since he recently was hired full-time by the NBA.
Cutler began refereeing as a hobby eight years ago, was discovered at a Los Angeles camp by former NBA officiating director Ed Rush, and soon went to work in the D-League.
I know Nicholas Buchert also got the call-up to full-time NBA officiating. Have to say I hope the powers that be can find suitable replacements because the D-League definitely benefited from having solid officials like these guys - hence, that's probably why they made the jump.
Texas Legends Complete D-League Expansion Draft; Now Have Mookie Wright's Rights
by Scott Schroeder on Aug 31, 2010 6:36 PM EDT
in Ridiculous-osity
7 comments
The Texas Legends, the NBA Development League affiliate of the Dallas Mavericks, completed their expansion "draft" Monday with the results being announced this afternoon.
The only surprise from my projection of what head coach Nancy Lieberman and company would do was the selection of James "Mookie" Wright instead of Rodney "I used to look like this but now I look like this" Webb. The other players picked up in the draft were Joe Crawford, Diamon Simpson, Dar Tucker, Michael Fey, Ryan Forehan-Kelly, Gabriel Hughes, Frank Robinson, James Peters, and Keith Clark.
This doesn't mean that these players will play for the Legends this season, just that if they decide to play in the D-League this season, they'll play for the Legends. Essentially, the Legends are now caught up with every other team in that they have a list of returning players that have yet to decide (in most cases) if they'll actually return.
I would expect a maximum of five of these players to actually end up going to camp with the Legends because Simpson, Fey, Robinson and Forehan-Kelly are already signed overseas and I would assume Crawford will either end up in the NBA or Europe before all is said and done. This doesn't mean that they won't eventually play for the Legends, however, as numerous players have been able to pick up a couple of paychecks in Europe before returning to the comfy confines of the D-League in search of the elusive call-up.
As the team's press release noted, "Now that the Legends have made their draft picks, the players must sign with the D-League in order to truly be Legends."
I wonder what this means for Draino.
Dwayne Jones Is Taking His Talents Back To Phoenix
I hope Jones sticks in the NBA this year, even if it isn't with the Suns. That said, he's only 151 rebounds and 311 free-throw attempts from becoming the D-League's career leader in both.
From Paul Coro:
The Suns took little risk in bringing back Jones. The structure of the one-year deal pays him a small amount to come to training camp and another small portion if he makes the opening night roster. The Suns would have the ability to waive him at no extended cost all the way up until the January date that contracts become guaranteed.
The Texas Legends Will Draft The Los Angeles D-Fenders Next Week. Excited?!
by Scott Schroeder on Aug 27, 2010 3:00 PM EDT
in Ridiculous-osity
10 comments
The NBA Development League's new team, the Texas Legends, will take the first step towards formulating their roster for the upcoming 2010-11 season with the 2010 NBA D-League Expansion Draft.
The Expansion Draft pool will be comprised of 14 players from the 2009-10 "Returning Player List" from the Los Angeles D-Fenders, which will be on hiatus during the 2010-11 NBA D-League season. Of the 14, the Legends will select 10.
The above is from a press release I received in my inbox Thursday morning, but just decided to bring it to you now because I wasn't sure how to present it to my loyal subjects readers.
I mean, do we really need to call it an expansion draft if it's just one team taking over another team's roster? And if the D-Fenders are indeed coming back, do they get to do an expansion draft of the Legends' roster next offseason? And if JWoww and Snooki wanted to be such good friends, why did they write that note to Sammi when they knew it would just cause drama in the Jersey Shore house?
Even though I don't have any definitive answers to my previous questions (I'm guessing "no", "no" and "I hope we find out next week"), I do have the 14 players that the Legends will be able to pick their 10 from:
| Player | Pos. | Ht. | Wt. | College | |||
|
|
|||||||
| Keith Clark | F | 6-8 | 245 | Oklahoma | |||
| Joe Crawford | G | 6-5 | 210 | Kentucky | |||
| Michael Fey | C | 7-0 | 270 | UCLA | |||
| Ryan Forehan-Kelly | G/F | 6-6 | 195 | California | |||
| Gabriel Hughes | C | 7-0 | 240 | California | |||
| Lawrence McKenzie | G | 6-2 | 190 | Minnesota | |||
| James Peters | F | 6-8 | 215 | UNLV | |||
| Ray Reese | F | 6-5 | 210 | Tulsa | |||
| Frank Robinson | G | 6-4 | 220 | Cal-State Fullerton | |||
| Diamon Simpson | F | 6-7 | 230 | St. Mary's (CA) | |||
| Dar Tucker | G | 6-4 | 205 | DePaul | |||
| Rodney Webb | F | 6-7 | 240 | Florida Atlantic | |||
| Horace Wormely | G | 5-7 | 160 | Vanguard | |||
| James Wright | G | 6-1 | 185 | Colorado | |||
If you want to know how I'd "draft" them, keep reading.
Jeremy Pargo Signs With Maccabi Tel-Aviv; Possibly To Replace Mikhail Torrance
by Scott Schroeder on Aug 27, 2010 11:00 AM EDT
in 2010 Vegas Summer League
2 comments
Jeremy Pargo, little brother of current NBA free agent Jannero Pargo, has signed with basketball powerhouse Maccabi Tel-Aviv according to the team's official site (and the above nicely produced highlight package, I guess).
There have been rumors in the media that Pargo has been signed to take the roster spot of Mikhail Torrance who is currently recovering after collapsing while preparing to join his new teammates in Israel.
The creatively-inefficient scorer played this summer for both the Charlotte Bobcats and Minnesota Timberwolves in the Orlando and Vegas Summer Leagues, respectively, but wasn't able to quiet his doubters as he shot just 33% from the field and averaged a horrendous 4.6 turnovers for the Wolves in Vegas.
On the plus side, though, Pargo averaged 4.6 assists and 1.6 steals - the former number pretty impressive considering the amount of time (none) that he was able to build a rapport with his teammates.
Dear NBA Executive,
Do you remember when you decided to not give Rod Benson an opportunity on your team even though he clearly deserved it?
Well, now he's off to Korea and we'll be without his music videos here in the good ol' U.S. of A.
Your pal,
Scott
P.S. Apparently this will be the first single on Benson's to-be-released-soon mixtape. Hopefully we get a release date eventually so Benson doesn't become the next 50 Tyson.
7 days ago
Scott Schroeder
2 comments
2 recs
Former Cavaliers GM Danny Ferry Will Soon Be In Charge Of The Austin Toros
by Scott Schroeder on Aug 26, 2010 10:01 AM EDT
in NBA D-League Coaching News
6 comments
Dell Demps spent three season as general manager of the Austin Toros before being hired last month to the same position with the New Orleans Hornets, becoming the first person to use the D-League as a stepping stone to the top of an NBA front office.
Danny Ferry may be hoping he's the next.
Ferry, who resigned as Cleveland Cavaliers GM in June after five years on the job, is expected to be officially announced as a member of the San Antonio Spurs' front office by week's end, reports Mike Monroe of the San Antonio Express-News. Though "formal delineation" of front office duties and titles has yet to be determined, according to the report, Ferry will oversee the Toros, the Spurs' D-League team.
That's how brilliant D-League reporter Scott Schroeder started my his most recent post over at Aol FanHouse.
What does this mean for the Toros? Well, I think we'll have to wait and see due to this:
Ferry didn't have complete control of call-ups and assignments in Erie, however, according to an interview with an owner of the Cleveland Cavaliers' affiliated Erie BayHawks.
"[Player movement between the Cavaliers and BayHawks] was more of Mike Brown's decision than it was Danny Ferry's decision," Demetriou said. "Danny used to tell me that."
In the meantime, I think it's great that a rather high-profile NBA executive will now be running the basketball operations of a D-League team. Between Ferry and Eric Musselman, the talent being brought into the D-League this year is pretty impressive.
Grading NBA Teams’ Usage of the D-League: Pacific Division
Myself and Jon L, along with D-League Digest's Matt Hubert, everywhere's Matt Moore and Truehoop Network bloggers from around the world graded NBA team's usage of the D-League.
Check it out.
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