Lost Time Is Not Found Again is what the MPS blog crew has been reading today.

+ LeBron James goes buck wild for Stephon Curry. {The Dagger.}

+ Real Madrid basketball club tries to sign Stephon Marbury. Or not. {Slam Online.}

+ The Mets, oh so close to locking up K-Rod. {MLB Trade Rumors.}

+ Why are NBA coaches getting the axe? {Baller Blogger.}

+ Non-sports: “Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo” is a grammatically correct sentence. {Wikipedia.} 2008 Gummy Awards. {Stereogum.}

Quotable:

“It’s more interesting, though, to look at the efficiency levels the players maintained vs. their % of possessions used. The mark of a truly great offensive player is to maintain a high level of efficiency while taking on a large share of the team’s offensive responsibility, and even though Kobe’s numbers are impressive, Jordan is consistently more efficient than Bryant no matter if he’s using more possessions or not. Also, note the translated defensive ratings: aside from their age-21 seasons, MJ is better (sometimes vastly so) at every turn.

In other words — and this should be obvious — when we watch Kobe play, we’re seeing a far lesser version of Michael Jordan in action. Similar in style and mannerism, maybe, but when we translate the statistics for era, it becomes very clear that Jordan was actually the one “playing chess” while Bryant “plays checkers”. This isn’t meant to denigrate Kobe Bryant or FreeDarko’s characterization of him, of course, but rather to highlight the fact that MJ operated on a different level than perhaps anyone else in NBA history (as we’ve seen time and again, compare anyone to Jordan and they’ll invariably fall short). I’ve found that the more time passes, the greater the temptation is to focus on current players as “this generation’s (insert Hall of Famer here)”… Fortunately, by looking at the numbers we can separating hype from reality and more impartially judge the merit of such comparisons.” – Neil Paine, Basketball Reference