Deron Williams Isn’t Scared Of Turkey

Deron Williams isn’t scared or afraid. He’s also sick of justifying his decision. He wants to play in Turkey. The club over there, Besiktas, wants him to come. To him, that’s all that should matter. Williams spoke to the Salt Lake Tribune and vented on a number of things, most interestingly about his soon-to-be-realized trip to play professionally in Turkey. He says he saw the Rick Reilly piece we highlighted and isn’t concerned about the horror stories. 95% of the people he’s talked to about Turkey have told him positive stuff and with the entire organization having his back, Williams can’t wait to get there … Dwyane Wade wants Miami to get the credit for creating the new age NBA landscape, saying their once-in-a-lifetime summer last year changed the game for everyone involved and created a trend, telling ESPNChicago.com: “When you think about the great teams, the Bill Russell teams, you think about all these teams that have four Hall of Famers, three Hall of Famers, five Hall of Famers. It’s just now in today’s world, social media, and all these things, it becomes bigger than it was back in the day. But, it was some of the same stuff happening [back then].” We definitely agree that the climate around the game is changing, but what exactly does Wade believe they started? The very best teams have always brought great players together. If he means they started the trend of players actually trying to team up together, you can make that case. NBA players have always wanted to do that stuff, but last summer was one of the few times when it all actually worked out … While most figured he would end up in prep school this year, top recruit Andre Drummond will attend UConn to play for the defending champs. On Twitter, he’s already calling for a repeat, and while it’s way too early to say anything definitive on this season, Drummond’s hype is through the roof. Several analysts are calling him one of the best big man prospects of the last 10-20 years. But besides his talent, the 6-11 Drummond has had his attitude and work ethic questioned at times. Check out this frightening mixtape of him where he’s doing things someone his size shouldn’t be doing. You’re looking at possibly the No. 1 pick next June … Shaquille Johnson might not be on Drummond’s level as a player, but the Auburn recruit is easily the best dunker in high school, and after beating Derrick Williams in the Boost Mobile Elite 24 dunk contest, we might need to start talking about him pretty soon as one of the best dunkers in the world. In the Elite 24 game, Mitch McGary not only broke one of the backboards, he did it during warm-ups. Thankfully, they had an extra backboard around so that they could actually play the game. The “Raymond Lewis” team lost to the “Marques Johnson” team, 142-132 and the big stars on the day were Justin Anderson (23 points) and Kyle Anderson (18 points, eight assists), who shared MVP honors while Aquille Carr was big in the loss (21 points, 10 assists, seven rebounds) … And outstanding traffic warrants are the only reason Ron Artest isn’t Metta World Peace just yet. He has to wait until September 16 to hear a ruling … We’re out like World Peace (for now).