Ron Adams was in his mid-60s when the Warriors hired him away from the Celtics. Steve Kerr wanted Adams to freely speak his mind the way Tex Winter did in the 1990s with Phil Jackson's Bulls.

“I wanted a truth-teller, somebody to tell me, ‘You gotta do this, and you gotta do that,’ completely unfiltered,” Kerr said. “Somebody whose experience and wisdom made everyone stand up and listen. I knew right then that we were talking to the right guy, and I’m just thankful we have him because he’s been instrumental in all that we’ve done.

“Ron Adams, he’s our Tex.”

Adams is known as a curious thinker and reader with strong interests outside of basketball. Adams is eager to talk big ideas such as philosophy, religion, sociology and politics.

James Harden is confident the Houston Rockets will have a special season.

"This is the year. For sure," Harden said when asked about his expectations for the Rockets.

Harden reached The Finals in 2011 with the Thunder but he believes this Rockets team might be superior.

"The front office -- [general manager] Daryl Morey and [CEO] Tad Brown -- those guys did an unbelievable job," Harden said. "From last year, bringing [Eric Gordon] and [Ryan Anderson] over. Then obviously adding [Chris Paul] and [PJ Tucker] and [Luc Mbah a Moute] and then you get [Gerald Green] and Joe Johnson.

"This is probably the best team I've ever been a part of, from top to bottom. The chemistry that we have, included with the coaching staff -- I mean, we're having a lot of fun."

Dirk Nowitzki disagrees with the strategy laid out by Mark Cuban for the Mavericks to tank the remainder of the season.

"You don't really want a culture here that's just giving up and quitting and not playing hard," Nowitzki said after Monday's win by the Mavericks over the Pacers. "I think it just sets the wrong tone for the future.

"I think it's important for our young guys to learn how to compete and to compete all the time, play hard. You play your minutes hard. That's the only way to get better. That's the only way to play in this league, and whatever happens after the season, we'll just go from there. But for now, you play your minutes hard and you play to win."

The win was the first one by the Mavericks since Cuban received a $600,000 fine for revealing that he told his team that tanking was the best course for the franchise.

"You don't want to have an acceptance of losing," Harrison Barnes told ESPN. "Obviously, the quotes about tanking and all that type of stuff, you can't avoid that. We've been getting asked about that since they were said, but at the end of the day as professionals, as players, you have to go out there and you have to play to win.

"Any time you don't play to win or you're just kind of going through the motions, that can become contagious. That can become a habit, and that can become your culture. 'Oh, it's OK for us to do this. Oh, it's OK for us to not give full effort.' Then next season rolls around, and you can't flip that switch. It's still that malaise that you had from the year before."

Daryl Morey believes draft picks are the easiest way for trades to happen since it's the most effective way of equalizing the values of players.

Teams have become increasingly reluctant to relinquish future first round picks in trades over the past few seasons.

“They’re like cigarettes in prison. That’s the only currency you have,” Morey said Saturday at the “Take That for Data” panel. “The value changes up and down all the time, and it makes for a not-very-liquid market.”

The Phoenix Suns will not "strategically rest" any of their veteran players as they did last season with Tyson Chandler and Eric Bledsoe.

“We’re planning on doing what we have been doing, that’s playing our young players. For us, that’s not a change,” Ryan McDonough said. “… We want to continue to have them improve and get minutes and try to win as many games as we can.”

Jay Triano said he has not interest in playing for a better position in the lottery.

“I have been told nothing other than try to win games,” he said. “So my goal is to try to win, and that is not tanking.”

The decision to bench Bledsoe played a part in his request to be traded.

“I think we learned from last year with guys sitting out," Triano said. "I don’t think that was real productive for us.”

“As we found out last year, it is a lottery,” McDonough said. “The pingpong balls bounce around and come out in a different order.”

McDonough said there’s also “pretty good depth” at the top of the draft, so it wouldn't be a disaster if Phoenix fails to land the No. 1 pick.

“If we win a few more games and end up getting slotted lower in the lottery, then we’re fine with that,” he said.

Mark Cuban admitted to telling players on the Mavericks that losing games at this point in the season represents the best course for the franchise.

“I’m probably not supposed to say this, but, like, I just had dinner with a bunch of our guys the other night and here we are, you know, we weren’t competing for the playoffs I was like, ‘Look, losing is our best option,’” Cuban said on Dr. J's show. “Adam [Silver] would hate hearing that, but I at least sat down and I explained it to them. And I explained what our plans were going to be this summer, that we’re not going to tank again, this was, like, a year-and-a-half tanking and that was too brutal for me. But being transparent, I think that’s the key to being kind of a players owner and having stability."

Earlier in the season, Cuban spoke of a vastly different strategy after the Mavericks started the season 2-12.

"And until we're eliminated, we ain't tanking here, either," he said. 

"I still think we can turn this around."

James Harden heads into the All-Star break as the sixth consecutive different leader in the NBA in PER at 30.6.

Russell Westbrook led the NBA in PER at the break last season and went onto win MVP. The players with an asterisk beside their name won MVP in that respective season.

Pre-ASG/Post-ASG/Total

17-18: James Harden: 30.6 

16-17: Russell Westbrook*: 29.7 / 34.1 / 30.9

15-16: Stephen Curry*: 32.0 / 31.5 / 31.0

14-15: Anthony Davis: 31.6 / 28.8 / 30.7

13-14: Kevin Durant*: 30.2 / 28.2 / 29.5

12-13: LeBron James*: 31.1 / 32.3 / 31.5

11-12: LeBron James*: 31.5 / 30.0 / 30.8

10-11: LeBron James: 26.4 / 29.3 / 27.4

09-10: LeBron James*: 31.0 / 31.2 / 31.1

08-09: LeBron James*: 31.4 / 32.1 / 31.7

07-08: LeBron James: 29.3 / 28.6 / 29.0

06-07: Dwyane Wade: 29.1 / 18.2 / 28.1

05-06: LeBron James: 28.6 / 27.0 / 27.8

04-05: Kevin Garnett: 27.6 / 29.3 / 28.1

03-04: Kevin Garnett*: 29.0 / 30.3 / 29.5

02-03: Tracy McGrady: 28.3 / 33.2 / 30.3

01-02: Shaquille O’Neal: 29.1 / 30.1 / 29.6

00-01: Shaquille O’Neal: 27.8 / 33.2 / 30.3

99-00: Shaquille O’Neal*: 29.7 / 31.8 / 30.5

98-99: Shaquille O’Neal: 30.5 (no All-Star Game)

97-98: Shaquille O’Neal: 29.3 / 28.3 / 28.6

96-97: Michael Jordan: 29.0 / 25.9 / 27.7

95-96: David Robinson: 28.9 / 30.2 / 29.5

94-95: David Robinson*: 28.6 / 29.6 / 29.0

93-94: David Robinson: 29.3 / 32.3 / 30.6

92-93: Michael Jordan: 29.0 / 31.3 / 29.8

91-92: David Robinson: 27.5 / 26.7 / 27.2

90-91: Michael Jordan*: 31.2 / 32.0 / 31.5

89-90: Michael Jordan: 29.3 / 33.4 / 31.0

88-89: Michael Jordan: 31.7 / 30.3 / 31.1

87-88: Michael Jordan*: 32.4 / 30.9 / 31.7

86-87: Michael Jordan: 27.5 / 32.4 / 29.7

85-86: Magic Johnson: 24.6 / 22.7 / 23.7

The New York Knicks will prioritize playing time to their young point guards over Jarrett Jack when they return from the All-Star break.

The Knicks have Frank Ntilikina, Emmanuel Mudiay and Trey Burke at point guard.

"It's probably all three of those young guys (playing more) — Frank, Emmanuel and Trey — and we'll slide a couple of them in the two spot a little bit," Jeff Hornacek said. "Whether it's Trey and Emmanuel or some combination of those guys — Emmanuel and Frank."

Jack was signed as a stopgap point guard.

"We don't want (Ntilikina) to always be off the ball, either," Hornacek said. "We want to play him on the ball. So that he continues to get that taste of the point guard position."

The decision from the New York Knicks to trade Willy Hernangomez was largely about deepening their pool of future draft picks. The Knicks acquired a pair of second round picks from the Charlotte Hornets for Hernangomez after they were unable to find a team willing to send a first round pick.

“I think the fact that we were able to get two in a deal like that and really kind of fit to our plan of acquiring picks in those years,” Scott Perry said. “Historically with this franchise there have not been a lot of picks involved, and we talked about wanting to build something sustainable and I think one of the most important parts of that is having a cupboard full of picks if you will. And I think this deal allowed us to do that. We have all of our picks in place, and we can add other young athletes or use the picks in other ways to obtain talent.”

New York owns two second round picks this June.

“The Knicks are trying to find a Terry Rozier before he becomes Terry Rozier,” one NBA scout said of the Knicks’ thinking entering the deadline.

Hernangomez was a first-team All Rookie selection last season.