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Amare Stoudemire scored 17 points before dislocating his left pinky and the Suns, with their regulars together for the first time, beat the short-handed Thunder 102-93 on Thursday.

Ring ceremony brings lots of bling and tears

By Rob Peterson
Posted Oct 29 2008 12:28PM

BOSTON — Scot Pollard bounded out of the crowd like a contestant on “The Price is Right” to receive his ring. Tony Allen and Kevin Garnett slipped on theirs immediately. Ray Allen flashed his for the in-house camera. And Paul Pierce was openly weeping the whole time.

In an electric and emotional pregame ceremony, the Boston Celtics received their championship rings from NBA Commissioner David Stern and Celtics managing partner and CEO Wyc Grousbeck at the TD BankNorth Garden in front of a standing room only crowd who stood for the whole ceremony.

No one in the house seemed to mind the Celtics opening night opponents, the Cleveland Cavaliers, sought sanctuary in the safety of their locker room.

“I didn't know they were invited,” Celtics coach Doc Rivers joked before the game.

link: http://www.nba.com/2008/news/features/rob_peterson/10/28/ringceremony/index.html

-Miami Heat free agent forward/center Udonis Haslem has opted to remain with the Heat, according to a source, turning down bigger offers for the full mid-level exception from the Dallas Mavericks and Denver Nuggets. Immediate terms of Haslem's new deal with the Heat were not available.

The Heat viewed keeping Haslem as a must, even after signing LeBron James and Chris Bosh and re-signing Dwyane Wade last week. The 30-year-old's experience and toughness in the paint made him more necessary than ever next season, with Bosh not looking to play center on a regular basis and less able to guard physical post players than Haslem, who's spend all seven of his NBA seasons in Miami since signing as a free agent out of Florida in 2003.

Haslem averaged 12.7 points and 10.4 rebounds last season for Miami.

In an e-mail to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel Monday, Haslem said, "Turned down full mid level from Dallas and Denver. See u next season."

The Mavericks and Nuggets both are seeking additional big men, though Denver's need is more immediate with Kenyon Martin out for several months, if not all of next season, after a knee injury, and Chris Andersen recovering from offseason surgery. The Heat had less than the mid-level to offer Haslem but did have some room after James, Wade and Bosh each took less than the max to sign in Miami. The Heat wants to use that room to sign both Haslem and free agent forward Mike Miller.

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-The Phoenix Suns didn't want their summer to be defined by losing Amar'e Stoudemire to the New York Knicks, and they made sure of it Sunday night with two major deals, acquiring veteran forward Hedo Turkoglu from the Toronto Raptors for guard Leandro Barbosa and agreeing to a trade with the Atlanta Hawks that will bring restricted free agent Josh Childress, whose rights the Hawks still hold, to Phoenix in exchange for a second-round pick. Childress will receive a five-year, $34 million deal from Phoenix.

Turkoglu and Childress were both coveted by the Suns' former general manager, Steve Kerr, and even after his departure the club went ahead and got both players, who will bring much-needed depth to one of the league's older teams and provide help in several ways for Steve Nash and Grant Hill next season. The Arizona Republic first reported the Turkoglu acquisition and Yahoo! Sports first reported the Childress trade.

Because Phoenix received an eight-figure trade exception for agreeing to give Stoudemire an extra year on his $100 million contract, the Suns could bring in Turkoglu's $9.8 million salary for next season while only giving away Barbosa's $7.1 million contract, the final year of his deal.

A source said that Suns coach Alvin Gentry had also been "a big Childress guy" for many years and wanted to have more depth and flexibility on the roster next season. Phoenix played most of the postseason with just a 10-man rotation and felt it needed to get younger and deeper with the 36-year-old Nash and the 37-year-old Hill both expected to log big minutes again next year, and with starting two-guard Jason Richardson entering the last year of his contract. The 31-year-old Turkoglu and the 27-year-old Childress, who has played the last two seasons for Olympiacos in Greece, fit the bill, and also provide more pieces in case the Suns try to make another major acquisition down the road.

Phoenix had already signed free agent forward Hakim Warrick to a four-year, $18 million contract this summer, but ''we didn't want to fall off the earth with Amar'e leaving," a Suns source said.

Turkoglu will likely start at Stoudemire's power forward position next season and that will give the Suns a very different look at that spot and also give them more options. The 6-8 Turkoglu excelled as a playmaker for the Magic in the playoffs in 2009, running the pick-and-roll with All-Pro center Dwight Howard relentlessly in Orlando's Eastern Conference finals win over the Cavs. In Phoenix, he could have a similar role that would allow Nash to play more off the ball and not have as much pressure game in and out as the team's chief ballhandler.

Turkoglu signed a five-year, $53-million deal with the Raptors last summer, a seeming perfect match for the Turkish star, whose wife loved the cosmopolitan nature of Toronto. In doing so Turkoglu abruptly left the Portland Trail Blazers at the aisle, after the Blazers thought they had reached agreement on a free agent deal with him.

But Toronto turned out to be a nightmare for Turkoglu, who never meshed with Chris Bosh and who was caught in an incident where he had said he was too ill to play a game, but was seen later that evening at a local nightclub. Turkoglu initially said he wanted to be traded from the Raptors, then recanted and the team had indicated as recently as Saturday that it planned to bring Turkoglu back into the fold next season.

But the Suns' interest in him made a deal happen very quickly.

Childress had an NBA out in his contract with Olympiacos, but had to exercise it by Thursday or return to Olympiacos for a third and final season. He signed a three-year, $20 million deal with the Greek team in 2008.

Once the Hawks committed to re-signing Joe Johnson for a max-level, $124 million deal, Atlanta had no chance to re-sign Childress. Several teams inquired about Childress but were hoping to sign him for the $5.8 mid-level exception and thought he would likely command more money with so many teams having cleared significant salary cap room this summer.

Barbosa, 27, acquired in a Draft day deal from the Spurs in 2003, had moments of brilliance with the Suns, most notably in the 2005 playoffs, when he helped bring Phoenix back from a 3-1 deficit in the first round against the Lakers to win in seven games. His speed with the ball made him one of the league's most dangerous players in the open court. But injuries had slowed his effectiveness in recent seasons, and the emergence of Goran Dragic down the stretch and in the playoffs last year took away a lot of Barbosa's minutes.

link: NBA