5. NBA.com
The NBA recently revamped both its mobile app and website, and boy are they both a work in progress. The issues with the mobile app were highlighted by none other than LeBron James, who was quick to tweet out that the formatting on the boxscore wasn’t fit for a king:
Luckily the NBA programmers were quick to fix the app but NBA.com looks plain awful. It’s clunky and significantly harder to navigate. The new scoreboard on the left side is inconvenient and requires scrolling to view all the games, and it takes up so much of the main page that to even view any of the stories requires more clicking and scrolling. The new layout of the stats page is also confusing and difficult to sort the stats or players. All we need now is for LeBron to tweet about the website and maybe they’ll fix that too.
Mudiay has not had a strong showing this preseason – bad turnovers, missed shots and very poor shooting mechanics have fans already questioning if he’s still the Nuggets’ go-to-guy at point guard. Worst of all, Mudiay let D’Angelo Russell go OFF two games in a row, and now we have to deal with an endless supply of Lakers trash talk like this:
In two games against the Nuggets last week Russell scored a combined 54 points while shooting a sizzling 53 percent from three. Mudiay, on the other hand, scored a combined 18 points and didn’t make a single three pointer. For now, Lakers fans have settled the debate that Russell is a better player than Mudiay, and we have no way to retort. Emmanuel, you’ve got some work to do.
3. Miami Heat
The Miami Heat came out this week and announced they will likely not be releasing Chris Bosh until after March 1, meaning the 32 year-old power forward would not be eligible for the playoffs if a different team were to sign him. Miami can apply for salary-cap relief on Bosh’s contract one year after his last game which would be February 9. However, if Bosh plays at least 25 games with a different team either this year or next (playoffs included) then the Heat would be forced to take his contract on their salary cap. Bosh is insistent on being able to clear medically with a different team, but with this announcement Pat Riley has made it clear that he wants to minimize the risk of that happening. Preventing Bosh from playing in the playoffs this season is one way to do just that.
Ironically, it’s likely the Heat want to clear Bosh’s salary in order to have more cap room to make a run at a big free agent next summer when Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant, Blake Griffin and Chris Paul will be on the market. But screwing a player who has helped bring you two world titles out of a different opportunity isn’t the right way to gain favor in the eyes of potential suitors. Basketball will always be a business, but this a bad move for Miami.
2. Derrick Rose and His Lawyers
Speaking of bad PR, Derrick Rose certainly isn’t doing himself any favors from that standpoint. He’s missed the past few preseason games while on trial in a $21 million civil lawsuit that alleges he and two friends raped a woman in 2013. Rose and his defense team are adamant that the "Jane Doe" is extorting and that he will win the suit, but Rose will not be coming away from this all squeaky clean regardless of the outcome.
In fact, Rose had said some pretty horrible things both in his testimony and while on the stand:
Rose's lawyers had one job, and allowing him to say stuff like this was not it.
1. Denver Broncos
If you’re not a Broncos fan, you can rest easy and probably stop reading here. The past five days have not been kind to the defending Super Bowl champions. On Sunday the Broncos got whooped at home by the Atlanta Falcons in a game that wasn’t nearly as close as the final score would appear, but if there was any hope of it being a wake-up call for Denver that hope dissipated quickly on Thursday night. The Broncos played their worst overall game in recent memory, starting with the lethargic defense on San Diego’s first few possessions that allowed the Chargers to eat up the entire first half, and somehow ending with an attempted Hail Mary pass in a last-ditch effort to tie the game that didn’t even make it to the freaking end zone.
It didn’t help that Trevor Siemian played so conservative that even Alex Smith was questioning why he never threw the ball downfield. It also didn’t help that every opportunity the Broncos had to gain any form of momentum was squandered by a holding penalty or a fumble or a safety or another holding penalty or poor blocking by the offensive line. The icing on the cake came when late in the fourth quarter running back C.J. Anderson scored a touchdown that would have put Denver within three points, only to have it called back by another holding penalty. A few plays later, Demaryius Thomas fumbled the ball and the Chargers recovered.
The Broncos are still 4-2 on the year and there are 10 more games to be played, so the season is far from over. But if they want any chance of repeating in Super Bowl 51, they can’t afford to lay an egg like this ever again.
