Hey everyone,

As promised, here is edition number two of the Podcast. It’s come a long way since last Friday. As always, I’d love as much feedback as possible, because we’re still tweaking the format and learning how to do it properly. The transitions are a lot smoother this time around, and we even have a guest (as will be the case most times).

Today Dave Power is on the show, and we discuss everything from the NBA trade deadline - who went where, who the new favorites are, if Rasho and Primoz Brezec will become the greatest Slovenian tag team of all time, and we introduce a weekly segment called Full Count. Enjoy!

Guest: Dave Power
Topic: NBA Trade Deadline
Length: 20:10 (will normally be 15-16 minutes)

The On Deck Circle Podcast 2 February 22

This article has been submitted by Yung DAP Dave Power.

The NCAA basketball season to date has been bizarre, with only one unbeaten team left in the Memphis Tigers and some surprises in the top 25 rankings. Said surprises include Drake and Purdue, both who were not in the preseason top 25, and did not receive a single vote to be in the rankings. Check this link to see the top 25; Drake is ranked 14 and 15 respectively in the AP Top 25 poll and the ESPN/USA Top 25 poll, while Purdue is ranked 19 and 23. But who are the best players in the country, the MVP’s of their own teams, the cream of the crop, or as the award says “The Player of the Year?” My top 5 contenders to date are as follows:
More after the jump!

This article has been submitted by David Andrew Power.

What do the ten worst teams in the NBA need in this year’s NBA draft? This year’s draft class is exceptional, at least on paper. With freshmen phenoms Eric Gordon, Derrick Rose and Michael Beasley, this draft has the potential to go down as one of the deepest drafts in the history of the NBA. Now to take a look at the teams and which players will help them back into the upper echelon of the NBA…

Miami Heat (9-40)
Derrick Rose, Memphis
14.1 PPG/ 4.3 APG/ 4.3 RPG
HT 6-3 WT 190 lbs
NBA Position: PG
If the Miami Heat end up having the first selection in the upcoming NBA Draft, they would surely draft Derrick Rose. Rose has many strengths, one being his ability to be a lock down defender. He is a freak athlete who uses his body extremely well to lock down opposing players and has very quick hands and keeps his body low to the ground making it almost impossible to get around him. Another talent he has is that he is a tall PG at 6-3 but what is more impressive is the fact that he is probably the quickest player in NCAA basketball. Since coming to Memphis at the beginning of the year Rose has become a better floor general, he runs that offense and as we all know, they are perfect on the season at 23-0. Rose is a perfect fit on the Miami Heat as Dwayne Wade can move over to his natural spot at SG (hopefully that cuts his turnovers down) and newly acquired Shawn Marion can play at his regular position, Small Forward. Unfortunately the Heat front court will still have problems. Udonis Haslem is a good power forward but they will be very bare at centre, but this is a starting point and Coach Riley needs somewhere to start, so why not with the best point guard to be eligible to be drafted since Chris Paul and Deron Williams in 2005? Think of Gary Payton, a 9 time NBA all star, and now give him the athletic ability of Kobe Bryant. Well that is what you put together to get Derrick Rose. NBA, watch out, “the glove” is back.
NBA Comparison: Dwayne Wade, Gary Payton
More after the jump!

Note: This article is a collaborative piece from Blake Murphy, Stu Wilkinson, Alex Pennycook, Samuel Cassady, Dave Power, Trevor Smith, Deven Hiscock, and Kyle Norton.

This Sunday while I’m deep into a medium pizza and a pound of wings ($20, Double Double Colossus Deal, what it do!) and an intense NBA Jam Session rematch with Stu (last year I defeated him in my rookie contest, this year we will be posting our box-score and a review article), the rest of the world will be watching the SuperBowl. Have you heard of it? Every television station and website (sports or not) has been covering the event non-stop for two weeks and I’ve actually made an active attempt to limit the amount of football coverage on the site to this Super Article. Upon launch of the site, I e-mailed all of our writers (potential or legit) with five questions they had the option to answer as part of an enormous SuperBowl panel. Well, here is my space- and time-saving brainchild come to fruition, with the responses of eight different writers to five burning SuperBowl questions. All the hype you need in just one article.
More after the jump!

This article is a Blake Murphy-Dave Power collaboration. Please forgive any statistical discrepancies as we wrote our parts two days apart.

Last year at the end of the season, Dave and I laid down our thoughts on who should win the NBA’s marquee end-of-season awards. Discussing awards at the end of the season is one of the most exciting sports topics for a lot of fans, especially in basketball where there are numerous high-profile awards and, usually, many viable candidates for each. With the season having crossed the midway point for 23 of the league’s 30 teams, Dave and I have decided to revisit our discussion from last year and publish our picks for the NBA’s six major awards, if the season were to end today. As always, feedback is encouraged, especially this time, since you can reply in kind with your own choices. Without further ado, here are our choices.
More after the jump!

Note: This article was contributed by the boy David Andrew Power aka Yung DAP.

MVP (Most Valuable Player)
Steve Nash
Straight to the point, I do not think this award can go to anyone else. It has been proven that when Nash does not play, the Suns rarely win. This year the Suns went 2-4 without Steve Nash in the line up, (0.33 winning percentage) but with him in the line up they have a record of 59 wins and 17 losses (winning percentage of 0.744). Nash is averaging 11.6 assists per game which is the highest output of his career, better then both his MVP years, and he’s also averaging 18.6 point per game, his second highest output in his career. The main argument is he just makes everyone around him better, the team gets easy buckets because of his ability to see the floor, as well as the fact that if you try to limit his passing abilities by trying to take away to passing lanes he can burn you with his .532 field goal percentage, (15th in the NBA/first among guards), as well as his .455 3-point shooting percentage (2nd in the NBA). As well as putting up these incredible numbers in team wins and individual categories, Steve Nash is also easily one of the most clutch players in the NBA. When the going gets rough, Nash gets scoring. Although the Suns are not involved in very many close games, when they are there is no doubt who will have the ball, having experienced this live when the Phoenix Suns strolled into Toronto and seeing Steve come down and hit a pull up 3 pointer on the break and then a ridiculous fade away to seal the deal. An odd occurrence is to hear Canadians “boo” Steve Nash since he is obviously a fan favorite, but on this night as he was getting Vince Carter type boo’s in Toronto, not out of hatred but out of total frustration that he was killing the Raptors. When it comes down to it, Steve Nash makes the Phoenix Suns tick and is undeniably the MVP of the league for the 3rd consecutive year.
More after the jump!