Green and Carlesimo Confirmed

As reported by Kevin Pelton at supersonics.com, Jeff Green and PJ Carlesimo have been confirmed as participants in the NBA Select team which will help Team USA prepare for the FIBA Championships in Vegas later this month. Carlesimo will serve as head coach for the team. The complete roster of the Select team is here.

Also, there's a brief Q&A with Sonic rookie Jeff Green on nba.com, wherein we learn that, well, we don't really learn anything at all. But if you're thirsty for Sonic news in any form, go ahead and take a look. Elsewhere at nba.com, Dave McMenamin estimates that Kevin Durant is on the bubble for making the roster for the FIBA tournament, and that he may be edged out by Tyson Chandler. Honestly, it's a no-lose proposition for the Sonics and Durant. If he makes the team, he gets to spend a few extra days playing with the best basketball players in the world. If he doesn't make the team, he gets to rest a bit before training camp. As a rookie, Durant (and Green, for that matter), may wind up hitting a wall this year come February, and playing in extra games during the summer won't help matters.

Nickels Bites Back

Greg Nickels, with finger planted firmly in the air to sense the direction of public opinion, has responded to Clay Bennett's response to his .... oh, who can keep track of it all, anyway?

Don't get me wrong, I'm solidly with Nickels in his position, but I'm not naïve enough to think that Nickels wouldn't be taking this position if it weren't for the efforts of Brian and the A Deal is a Deal organization. As a politician, Nickels is canny enough to know that one of the best positions to take in an argument is against someone the public despises. Government officials love this tactic: Politicians will always beat the drum against tobacco companies or sex offenders, even if there is no immediate danger, simply because they know they'll score points in the court of public opinion.

It helps, of course, when you have someone like Clay Bennett, who - like Michael Heisley in Vancouver a few years back - has been playing his new-found home like a piano in the Tulsa production of "A Music Man."

Unlike Harold Hill, though, Clay Bennett isn't selling us a pile of musical instruments and uniforms, he's trying to take away something that's been a part of Seattle for more than 40 years. Let's hope, like Hill, he sees the error of his ways soon enough.

Clay Bennett Is Not Amused

From Mike Seely of Seattle Weekly, in his Buzzer Beater blog, which any self-respecting Seattle sports fan reads with the avidity of George Hamilton scanning the UV index, comes a message from Clay Bennett.

The press release is apparently in response to Mayor Nickels' comments to the TNT and other local papers that the city is interested in sweetening the Key Arena pie in such a manner that the much-maligned building becomes suitable to Bennett & Co. To wit:

“In issuing our call to action last month, we were hopeful the Mayor would use his regional leadership platform to rally support for a solution. Instead he focused on old unworkable concepts that are not acceptable. It is clear that if all we have to discuss is the renovation of KeyArena, then a meeting with the Mayor will not be productive or necessary."

Consider the sabres rattled.