He's the Indiana University professor who got young Mark Cuban interested in advanced analytics, a pioneer of adjusted plus/minus, and a man who says some coaching moves in these playoffs have been flat wrong.

Chad Ford offers his third mock draft of 2013, in the wake of Tuesday night's NBA Draft Lottery.

Five dribbles of chatter from the league's front-office and coaching grapevines: Among the immediate concerns for the Indiana Pacers heading into the...

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Masai Ujiri has been identified as the Toronto Raptors' top target to replace Bryan Colangelo as general manager. The Raptors could offer Ujiri a salary in excess of $2 million to leave the Denver Nuggets. Ujiri is reportedly earning approximately $500,000 in the final season of his contract with the Nuggets. The Nuggets, however, are confident that they will be able to retain Ujiri.

The Toronto Raptors are pursuing Masai Ujiri to become the team's top basketball executive, according to sources. Ujiri was named the 2013 NBA Executive of the Year for his work as general manager of the Nuggets. Ujiri's contract with the Nuggets expires this summer and he has been in discussions on an extension. Korn/Ferry International, the search firm hired by MLSE to search for a new GM for the Raptors, has identified Ujiri as its top candidate. MLSE has until Monday to make a decision on whether to retain Bryan Colangelo, who could stay with the franchise under a new decision-maker. Ujiri worked for three years with the Raptors under Colangelo before becoming GM of the Nuggets.

COMMENTARY | Some might argue the Sacramento Kings' run of good luck hit a bump at the NBA draft lottery on Tuesday, May 21.

It’s not the worst thing in the world that Bryan Colangelo is staying with the Toronto Raptors in a nebulous, barely-specified role. It’s not the weirdest thing in the world, either, or even the weirdest decision that Raptors-owning Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment has ever made. It is suitably strange, though, to see Colangelo both promoted and being told to mind his manners when it comes to future personnel moves by his new boss, MLSE CEO Tim Leiweke. The Toronto Raptors’ general manager, Leiweke told reporters on Tuesday, will be the one making the final basketball-related decisions, and “he’s going to have to live with that,” along with living and working with the new Toronto Raptors GM. A GM that has yet to be named, by the way. Good thing Colangelo already traded away his 2013 lottery pick.

About four months ago, some NBA people were seriously discussing whether or not Tony Parker could make a legitimate claim to being the league's Most Valuable Player this season. That discussion was mostly bunk , on account of LeBron James existing, but it was an important step up in recognition for the evolution of the San Antonio Spurs point guard's game over the past few years — the vision, pace and timing he's added to his speed and quickness, the subtle in-and-out moves and slight feints he's mastered to keep even first-rate defenders off-balance, the feel he's developed for when to hunt his own offense and when to facilitate for others to make sure San Antonio's offensive machine is in prime working order. After skewing a bit toward the former with a team-high 14 shots and a game-high 20 points in the Spurs' Western Conference finals-opening win over the visiting Memphis Grizzlies on Sunday, Parker clearly veered back to the latter in Tuesday's Game 2, keeping Memphis' perimeter defenders at arm's length and dominating the opening three quarters of the game en route to a career-best 18 assists in a 93-89 overtime win that gave San Antonio a 2-0 lead in the best-of-seven series. Sure, there might have been a little bit of home-scorer's cooking on a couple of those credited dimes, but Parker's overall control of the game and mastery of a hard-working Grizzlies defense was undeniable. "He was unbelievable," longtime running buddy Tim Duncan said after the game . "I know he's exhausted. We asked a lot of him. He was controlling the ball every time down the floor and he was making every right play there was. He was finding people, and people knocked down shots for him."