John Hollinger

Atlanta

Senior NBA Columnist at The Athletic

@TheAthleticNBA Senior NBA columnist - ex-Grizzlies VP BB Ops - PER creator Wahoowa IG/Threads: TheJohnHollinger https://t.co/bsnvo5wQCB

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Articles

NBA free agency 2025: Myles Turner tops long list of starting-caliber center talent

1 week ago | nytimes.com | John Hollinger

If you need a center, you might be in luck; while there isn’t a max-worthy target out there, several starting-caliber big men hit the market this year, and many of them are gettable for rivals due to their own teams’ tight salary-cap situations. Even beyond that, the market for the tax and room-exception big men looks frothy, making this arguably the most interesting position of the summer in terms of player movement.
NBA free agency 2025: Behind Kuminga and Giddey, small forward class is lacking

1 week ago | nytimes.com | John Hollinger

Small forward has been the NBA’s hardest position to fill since roughly forever, and this season is no exception. It’s an underwhelming offseason market, with a couple of restricted free agents with fingers-crossed projections for future glory leading the pack and basically no other starter-quality players. Even deeper down, it’s hard to find value, as the market has only a few players who are worthy of even room-exception money.
NBA free agency 2025: Shooting guard class light on star power but not rotation help

1 week ago | nytimes.com | John Hollinger

If you’re looking for NBA All-Stars, you’ve come to the wrong place. It’s an underwhelming free-agent shooting guard market at the top, with basically no star talent available. At a lower level, however, there is a lot of value to be had. Several players grade out as starting-caliber or as plus rotation options based on my BORD$ formula (more on the methodology here), and at least a few of them could realistically be pried from their current teams due to cap situations.
NBA free agency 2025: James Harden, Kyrie Irving lead strong point guard class

1 week ago | nytimes.com | John Hollinger

Welcome to the exception that proves the rule. The NBA free-agent market this summer is generally quite underwhelming, but the point guard position is the one place that isn’t true. Three All-Stars top the list, and seven players here grade out as worth more than the projected nontaxpayer midlevel exception based on my BORD$ formula. (More on the methodology here.)That said, there may be less here than meets the eye.
Thunder eye NBA title

1 week ago | nba.com | John Hollinger

***INDIANAPOLIS — Oklahoma City head coach Mark Daigneault declared, “We have a flat locker room,” in a video call a week before the NBA Finals started, and he didn’t mean it was flat like day-old Schweppes. No, he meant that there was no hierarchy, no levels. The floor was open, and anyone could speak up — whether it was the NBA MVP or somebody who had played 20 total seconds of non-garbage-time minutes in the NBA Finals.
'Nobody's bigger than the program'

1 week ago | nytimes.com | John Hollinger

INDIANAPOLIS - Oklahoma City head coach Mark Daigneault declared, "We have a flat locker room," in a video call a week before the NBA Finals started, and he didn't mean it was flat like day-old Schweppes. No, he meant that there was no hierarchy, no levels. The floor was open, and anyone could speak up - whether it was the NBA MVP or somebody who had played 20 total seconds of non-garbage-time minutes in the NBA Finals.
LeBron? Harden? Kuminga? The Top 25 NBA free agents for the 2025 offseason

1 week ago | nytimes.com | John Hollinger

Who will be the next superstar to change teams in free agency? And how long will it be before it happens? The 2010s theater of "taking my talents to South Beach" and the whole league meeting with Kevin Durant in the Hamptons has been replaced by something a bit less dramatic and definitely more efficient: extensions for virtually every star-caliber player. Loosened rules on extensions mean elite players rarely hit free agency anymore.
Thunder struck with a midrange shooting slump at the wrong time in NBA Finals

2 weeks ago | nytimes.com | John Hollinger

INDIANAPOLIS - How do the Oklahoma City Thunder surprisingly find themselves down 2-1 to the Indiana Pacers in the NBA Finals? I can give you two versions of the story, both of which are equally valid. On one hand, there is the sheer fact of a more energetic Indiana side repeatedly outhustling, outscrapping, outrunning and ultimately outlasting Oklahoma City in Game 3. Call it "energy" or "playing with force" or whatever euphemism you want to use, but the tape doesn't lie.
What key plays from Thunder-Pacers Game 1 tell us about the NBA Finals going forward

3 weeks ago | nytimes.com | John Hollinger

OKLAHOMA CITY - So ... what exactly happened here, and what does it mean going forward? That's why I've been trying to figure out ever since I staggered out of Paycom Center late Thursday in the wake of the Indiana Pacers' stunning 111-110 comeback win against the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 1 of the NBA Finals. It wasn't just that the Pacers rallied from a 15-point fourth-quarter deficit; it was the way they came back.
Shake Down the Thunder

3 weeks ago | d3playbook.com | John Hollinger |Tyler Tachman |Steve Ulrich

JUNE 6, 2025 | composed by STEVE ULRICH What administrators, coaches, parents and fans are reading. #whyD3 Send tips to and/or via DM 🪅 It’s FRIDAY! 🏀 Hoop. There It Is. Did you know that the respective GM’s of the teams competing in the NBA Finals - the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Indiana Pacers - are both DIII grads? #WhyD3 and #d3hoops 📰 Are You Enjoying D3Playbook? Support our work with a subscription.