ONE: It’s been a while between Six Packs, and with the time off I’ve had over the New Year I thought it was only fitting to churn out what will undoubtedly be the most massive Sunday Six Pack of all time.
On the Aussie front, the biggest news this week has of course been [...]

Explain to me the logic in this. Trevor Ariza, a player who was instrumental in the Lakers 2009 Championship but who ultimately has achieved very little else in his career so far, refuses to accept the Lakers mid-level exception offer believing himself to be worth much more. Ron Artest, a veteran who has won defensive [...]

Having had time to reflect on the 2009 Finals I’ve come to a conclusion on what they really were. Not Kobe’s vindication, or Phil’s coronation. But something else: an anticlimax. There were at least four series that were more entertaining during these playoffs – Boston v Chicago, Houston v LA, Orlando v Boston and Orlando [...]

(AP Photo/David J. Phillip)
Hard to believe really, that I just watched a replay of the last game of the season. No more games on Foxtel or One. No more huddling around laptops at work with Justin TV streaming during lunch breaks. No more alt-tabbing frantically as the boss walks past your desk. The last Finals [...]

(AP Photo/Chris Graythen, Pool)
So it happened again. In last year’s Finals Game 4 we saw the Celtics historic comeback, an improbable win snatched from the jaws of defeat, a 48-minute nightmare that LA would wake from only to see the insurmountable 3-1 deficit staring back at them. It happened again this year, not a comeback [...]

Some quick thoughts on Game 3, which I watched last night.

MORE SHOTS FOR GASOL MORE SHOTS FOR GASOL MORE SHOTS FOR GASOL MORE SHOTS FOR GASOL MORE SHOTS FOR GASOL MORE SHOTS FOR GASOL MORE SHOTS FOR GASOL MORE SHOTS FOR GASOL MORE SHOTS FOR GASOL MORE SHOTS FOR GASOL MORE SHOTS FOR GASOL MORE [...]

AP Photo/Matt Sayles
The Orlando Magic were within inches of leveling this series at 1-1. Inches of Courtney Lee’s layup dropping through at the buzzer in regulation. Inches within a Dwight Howard deflection of a Kobe pass to Gasol that resulted in the game-sealing three point play. Make no mistake, this was a game that could [...]

AP Photo/Chris Carlson
I watched parts of Game 1 Friday afternoon at work, trading emails with a few friends about a possible Magic upset, before heading out to a farewell lunch. I checked the scores later on my phone – in the space of one quarter the game had been blown to high hell. Curious to [...]

It always amuses me when I read a playoff series preview, how people do the position vs position thing, coach vs coach, bench vs bench, and then make some sort of conclusion that amounts to adding up points accrued along the way. Hell, it’s the easiest way to do it, and without trawling through two [...]

Kobe Bryant has now done something that Tim Duncan never did: lead his team to back-to-back Finals appearances. That thought startled me a little when it first entered my brain, but it’s true. Since MJ and the Bulls faced off against Karl Malone and the Jazz in ‘97 and ‘98, it’s been exceedingly difficult for [...]