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The Good, the Bad, the Kitchen Sink

By Terry Brown

Monday, November 4 Updated 11:40 AM EST

The Good

Glenn Robinson, F, Atlanta Hawks

Week's work: 3 games, 31.3 ppg, 7.3 rpg, 6 apg, 2.3 spg, 50% shooting, 96% from the line

Brothers and sisters, can we all join hands as we raise our voices in joyous praise. If you're all alone at home or work or play, place one hand on the screen and the other toward heaven. Scream Hallelujah! Jump. Spin. Dance if moved.

Glenn Robinson has been born again.

Maybe it was the Player of the Year honors in college that resulted in the Milwaukee Bucks making him the No. 1 draft pick in 1994 and $100,000,000 contract demands that were summarily denied. Maybe it was the 21.9 points per game as a rookie (to lead all rookies and all but nine NBA players) to go along with 6.4 rebounds that still placed him behind Jason Kidd and Grant Hill as Rookies of the Year. Maybe it was the seven out of eight seasons in the NBA scoring 20-plus points per game that put him on the trading block and in Atlanta.

Whatever it was, the Big Dog is now leading the entire league in scoring, averaging a career-high in rebounds, twice as many assists as ever and nearly twice as many steals while shooting career highs from the field and the line.

Zydrunas Ilgauskas is putting up nice numbers. Kwame Brown is turning heads. Read about Kobe Bryant below. But 30 points is sacred. Thirty, 31, 34 is downright gaudy. Record-breaking for a franchise that includes Dominique Wilkins and Moses Malone. Legendary if the guy who averaged 20 points per game over his career wins the Most Improved Award.

At the end of his junior season at Purdue, Robinson became the only Boilermaker to ever tally more than 1,000 points, 500 rebounds, 100 assists, 100 steals and 50 blocks in one season.

That was in 34 games. Let's see what he can do with 79 more this year.

The Bad

Eddy Curry, C, Chicago Bulls

Week's work: 3 games, 5 ppg, 1.7 rpg, 50% shooting

Any minute now, Eddy Curry is going to register his first steal of the season. That way, he can turn his efforts to somehow getting his first block and eventually his first assist.

In his first two games of the year, he had zero rebounds. That's 6-foot-11 inches and 31 minutes without a single board until he grabbed five last Saturday to go along with his 5 turnovers and 5 personal fouls on the year.

Those are the wounds.

The 2-1 record the lowly Bulls have put together with wins against the Charlotte Hornets and Boston Celtics without so much as a quarter's productivity from Curry is salt enough for even 285-pound 19 year olds.

The Ugly

Tick, tock, tick, tock. Saturday, Grant Hill admitted to feeling pain in the ankle that has limited him to 18 games over the previous two seasons. That first year in Orlando, he lasted a total of four games. Last year, he lasted 14 games while scoring 16.8 points and grabbing 6.9 boards. This year, he's averaging 16 and 4.8 in four games.

Ilgauksas of the Cleveland Cavs is not only leading the league in rebounds with 15.5 per contest, but at this pace, he'll have more boards than he did in all of the 1999 season in just one more game

Literally dunking over some rogue center named Frederick Weiss in an overseas game is nice. But doing the same thing to Tim Duncan, the reigning MVP, in an NBA regular-season contest is absolutely naughty. Vince Carter listed day-to-day two months before Christmas speaks of oracles, Achilles and poems complete with driving bass and hooks by Missy Elliot.

The Kitchen Sink

Forget about the 66 points, 29 rebounds, 24 assists, 3 steals and one block on 23 of 37 shooting from the field and 17 of 19 from the free-throw line Kobe Bryant put together on his way to consecutive triple-doubles. The real winner here is Phil Jackson. I used to think that Babyface was the only guy on the planet who could cheat on his girlfriend and before he could finish apologizing, have her thanking him for making the whole experience into a Top 10 hit. Add Phil to the list. Charley Rosen, his buddy and co-author on several biographies, will sell that many more books next run after chastising the NBA's best talent in a recent column. Kobe, meanwhile, is a better player than he ever has been. And Phil's Lakers are 2-2 after an 0-2 start without Shaquille O'Neal.

Can anyone on the Knicks' active roster dribble with his head up?

It isn't John Stockton's knees, ankles or back. It's the 40-year-old's shoulder. Not Jason Kidd or Gary Payton or John, himself, ever increased his assist average over five straight seasons. But one more year any better than Andre Miller's current run and we will have a winner. The Clipper point guard went from 5.8 apg his rookie season to 8 as a starter the next year, to 10.9 as the league leader the following season and is at 11.3 this year. And he's done it with smoke, mirrors, a handful of decent players and a whole lotta craft. With Miller running the offense for the Cavs, Lamond Murray and Wesley Person averaged 16.6 and 15.1 points per game last year, respectively. This year, without him, Murray averaged 7.8 in the preseason and has yet to make a single bucket for the Raptors while Person is scoring 3.7 per game for the Grizzlies. Meanwhile, Michael Olowokandi has gone from 11.1 ppg to 16.3 and 43 percent shooting to 50 percent. A star in the making is one thing. Making them with his own two hands and an orange ball is another.

On Nov. 2, No. 1 pick Yao Ming recorded his first block of the season against the Toronto Raptors. The 7-foot-6 center did it in his third game of the season. Incidentally, 6-foot-2 guard Voshon Lenard of the Raptors rejected two shots in the same game.

Mike Bibby: Last Year: 13.7 ppg, 2.8 rpg, 5 apg, 45% shooting

Bobby Jackson: This year: 15.2 ppg, 5.8 rpg, 3.2 apg, 42% shooting

No one has shot more three-pointers in the league than Boston's Antoine Walker. And, at 29 percent from long range, it's pretty safe to say that no one has missed more. But if Walker is to remedy this thing anytime soon, he better start launching more. No typo. Just atypical. Currently, he is averaging seven three-point attempts per game and scoring a career-low 14.7 points per game. Last year, he averaged 7.9 three-point attempts, shooting 34 percent while scoring 22.1. The year before that, he averaged 7.4 three-point attempts, shooting a career-high 36 percent and scoring a career-high 23.4. Bombs away. But that isn't going to change the fact that Celtic opponent's are averaging 106.7 points per game on 52 percent shooting.

Six days into the NBA seasons and there are only three undefeated teams. Betcha didn't think Desmond Mason would be one of those team's leading rebounders.

The End

"Being in a bar-room setting with a cold beer is where I'm at my best." -- Maverick head coach Don Nelson in black hat on suspension as his team wins first two games by 25 points.