Thursday Bolts – 8.18.11

A report says Daequan Cook is being pursued by a Spanish team. Of course he’s a restricted free agent but the Thunder did extend him a qualifying offer. The Spanish team evidently wants him for the entire season with no NBA opt-out.

Trey Kerby of TBJ lists 10 frontcourt players on the verge: “Ibaka is straight-up shredded and seems to be made of only muscle. Kudos. One thing that’s undeniable about Serge is his ability to reject opposing players. In a mere 27 minutes per game last season, Ibaka led the league in total blocks (198) and finished third in blocks per game (2.4). He’s simply a machine, and when he gets starter minutes he’ll be the most intimidating post defender not named Dwight Howard.”

Interesting though, KD is his No. 1: “What can you say about Kevin Durant that hasn’t already been said? He’s the prototypical good guy of the NBA — didn’t make a big deal about his contract extension last year, plays ball for the love of the game as proven by his pro-am tour around the United States and wears a backpack during press conferences. Durantula even gets tattoos in places that will be covered by his uniform and not in full display like most tatted-up ballers! Oh, and he’s pretty good on the hardwood too.”

Have you guys seen The Classical?

Michael Jordan talked about Andrew Bogut. Whoops.

Jenni Carlson keeping everyone morally sound with another thing on Perk: “Honestly, if you’d have given me the details of this past weekend’s incident, then told me to pick which Thunder player had been the on involved with it, I guarantee that Perkins wouldn’t have been among the first five guys that I picked. Heck, he might not have been in the first eight or nine. I would’ve probably lumped him into the no-way-they’d-do-that group of Nick Collison, Nazr Mohammed and Kevin Durant.”

Russell Westbrook and a few others met Diddy at UCLA. And of course The Jones killed a post about it.

Zach Lowe explains his top 100 list.

There was a little buzz Kobe might play in the Goodman vs. Drew, but it’s not happening: “Kobe was smiling and saying, ‘Eh, I don’t know if I’m going to be out there,'” Drew League commissioner Din Smiley told The Washington Post. “We’re going to see whats going to happen. [Bryant is] not [coming] right now, but after what happened [Tuesday], I wouldn’t be surprised. I don’t know if he’ll come, but he left us on a good note.”