FanHouse Russellwestbrook

FanHouse previews a player to watch from each NBA team in advance of the 2009-10 season.

The English dictionary defines relentless as "Jeff freaking Green." I'm not kidding. Go look it up. And if it doesn't say that, then your dictionary has been scared into a lie.

Jeff Green is the other-other Thunder. If Russell Westbrook is The Edge to Kevin Durant's Bono, Jeff Green is one of the other U2 members that you don't actually know because they aren't The Edge or Bono. But if you haven't been paying attention to Green because you've been too busy calling your friends to tell them Kevin Durant is breaking your mindskull, take a second look at the power forward for the Thunder. Because if Oklahoma City is going to take the next step this season, it won't be on the back of Westbrook, but the man they call Predator.

FanHouse previews all 30 NBA teams in advance of the 2009-10 season.

The goal of the Oklahoma City Thunder should be apparent: Rise from the dregs of the Western Conference and into the middle-of-the-pack. That's a realistic endeavor, and it will be the responsibility of coach Scott Brooks to get the Thunder there.

Nobody expects the Thunder to be lumped in with the Lakers, Spurs, Blazers, Nuggets, Mavericks or even Hornets. But it does seem doable for OKC to gain some separation from the Kings, Timberwolves and Grizzlies of the world.

It has been said of late the draft begins with Oklahoma City at No. 3. Well, Sam Presti didn't pull out a bag of tricks -- he took the somewhat expected pick, shooting guard James Harden of Arizona State. Harden figures to slide right into the Thunder line-up between Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant.

Speaking of Westbrook, who earlier this week bristled at the idea OKC could select point guard Ricky Rubio: he's going to love feeding Harden the ball. Harden is an incredibly efficient scorer. He even finished higher than Stephen Curry in True Shooting percentage last season. While not a perfect shooter, Harden has good athleticism and he was a solid defender in college. We'll see how much of an upgrade on Damien Wilkins and Thabo Sefolosha he can become.

Reports earlier this week had incumbent Oklahoma City point guard Russell Westbrook offering some public friction to the idea the Thunder could draft Ricky Rubio at No. 3 and slide Westbrook over to shooting guard. In fact, Westbrook's quote (published by ESPN) to the idea was two impossible-to-misinterpret words: "You trippin'."

But in a draft day appearance on ESPN's Rome is Burning this afternoon, Westbrook stepped back from those comments, saying he trusts the franchise and will do whatever is asked of him. He did reiterate that he feels he is a point guard -- "I've been a point guard my whole life," he said -- while giving off the vibe he didn't want to cause drama for the Thunder. We'll see tonight whether OKC has any concerns with a Westbrook-Rubio backcourt.

It's been a forgone conclusion for awhile, but on Wednesday it became official: Derrick Rose is the NBA's 2009 Rookie of the Year. He received the Eddie Gottlieb Trophy during a press conference earlier this afternoon.

There were several impressive rookies this year but Rose was the run-away winner of the award, receiving 111 of a possible 120 first-place votes; O.J. Mayo (five first place votes), Brook Lopez (two) and Russell Westbrook (two) accounted for the rest.

It's trophy time in the NBA, and the FanHouse crew has submitted its ballots. Find out which players deserve to take home the hardware and which ones don't, in our NBA Awards series. Next up: Rookie of the Year.

Coming into the season, most projected the rookie of the Year race to be fairly hotly contested between Derrick Rose and Michael Beasley, the top two picks in the NBA draft. But it wasn't: while Beasley spent time learning to contribute coming off the bench, Rose became one of the leaders on a team that made its way back to the playoffs. As such, the young Bull was our unanimous choice for Rookie of the Year honors.

The NBA features an 82 game season. As such, some weird stuff is going to happen. The Clippers will beat the Celtics. The Kings will beat the Suns. And often times, they're simply the result of back-to-backs, injuries, or that most crucial of variables: a bad shooting night.

But tonight was kind of different. As Robin Williams once said (yeah, I'm quoting Robin Williams, you got a problem with that?), "It's not the end of civilization, but you can see it from there."

The Charlotte Bobcats defeated the Los Angeles Lakers 94-84.

Less than an hour later, the Oklahoma Thunder defeated the San Antonio Spurs 96-95.

Okay, two lottery (most likely) teams beat two perennial contenders. Your average bizarro night. But there were things in these wins that forecast the future.

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* "During a recent trip to Toronto earlier this month, Matt Bonner talked with the media about how the combination of his grandfather - a 'Newfie' as he affectionately referred to him - and his wife being from Canada has led him to feel a strong connection to this country. Bonner also recently discovered that he has some cousins who are Canadian. Because of these factors Bonner has decided to file the necessary paperwork to gain his Canadian citizenship. Not only that, but he's also expressed a strong desire to play the Canadian national team." -- Hoops Addict.

Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the "lig." Doing Lines lets you know which one tops the list.

Mr. Pollakoff told you all about the ridiculous efforts of Misters Dwyane Wade and LeBron James, who faced off in Miami. But there's a whole 'nother galaxy of awesome out there. Its leader is ... Marvin Williams.

Marvey Milk had 28 points on 11-of-15 shooting, hitting four of six threes and adding four boards and a couple steals. Who did he do it against? That, that's not important. What is important is that, thanks in part to Marvelous, the Hawks were able to escape an awful shooting night from Mike Bibby. (Someone's always gotta clean up after that guy.)

Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the "lig." Doing Lines lets you know which one tops the list.

Andre Miller didn't move at the deadline, despite Philadelphia's season not living up to expectations and Dre due for July free agency. To be honest, there didn't seem to be as much interest in Miller as you would have predicted. Perhaps that came from the Sixers shutting down inquiries. It's easy to see why when Dre goes off as he did Saturday, whipping out 30 points, nine rebounds, two assists and no turnovers.