Filed Under » New York Knicks

Steve Nash's cellphone lit up Monday morning.

"I was working out and came back to my locker and saw my phone," said the Lakers point guard. "I had 20 voice mails and almost 30 texts waiting for me. I thought something terrible had happened."

It turns out that it was only Jason Kidd's retirement that spurred the onslaught of cell phone contact.

"You see Kidd retired?" read a text from Kobe Bryant. "He's only one year older than you, but you're more injury-prone. Has to make you think, huh?"

"Just came over the news that Jason Kidd is retiring," Lakers general manager Mitch Kupchak said in a voice mail. "Rasheed Wallace is retiring, Grant Hill. Seems like a lot of the older players are hanging them up. You and Kidd are both former Mavericks point guards who played last year in big cities. Seems like a lot of parallels, huh?" Kupchak's voice mail then ended with 15 seconds of him coughing and clearing his throat.

New York Knicks sixth man J.R. Smith has re-established himself as a bench player in the second round of the playoffs thanks to shooting 28-percent from the floor and 23-percent from three-point range.

"J.R. did a lot of great things for us during the regular season and there were times I thought maybe he should be in the game right from the opening tip as a starter," said Knicks head coach Mike Woodson. "But now I am positive he is a bench player. In fact, he's the kind of player I'd like to have as a twelfth man."

In addition to missing almost every shot he takes, Smith has also come off the bench to provide the Knicks with turnovers, fouls and mental mistakes.

"I just try to fill up the stat sheet any way I can," said Smith. "I have to make the best of the limited opportunities I have to play. Especially now because I feel like my opportunities to play are going to become increasingly limited."

Looking to avoid the insults against Carmelo Anthony's wife that have come to bog down the final minutes of most NBA games, commissioner David Stern ordered today that all jokes, slanders and cereal and food references about LaLa Anthony must be done before tip-off and submitted in writing.

"I get that opponents want to say horrible things about Carmelo's wife," said Stern. "They have made that abundantly clear. Insulting LaLa has become part of the fabric of this great game. I just request that it be taken care of before the game begins, so we don't have any incidents in the final minutes or postgame when players should be focusing more on basketball and not quite as much on good zingers about Mrs. Anthony."

The Boston Celtics expressed disappointment in Stern's mandate.

"I'll be honest: I know I have almost no shot of winning another ring with the Celtics," said Kevin Garnett. "The only reason I'm still playing is to say stuff to Carmelo about LaLa during games."

Yet minutes after Stern's announcement, the Celtics submitted 78 pages of cruel jokes about Carmelo's wife.

"We have a lot of material," said Celtics guard Jordan Crawford. "We would have sent more, but our printer ran out of ink."

Just a year removed from filing to copyright the term "Linsanity," former New York Knick Jeremy Lin received his smallest royalty check to date, one totaling just under two dollars.

"I remember when we had Linsanity merchandise wall-to-wall," said Jeff Huntsman, owner of a New York City sports apparel shop. "Jerseys, keychains, mugs, bumper stickers – you name it, we had it. Actually – have it – it's still here. It's just over there in that discount bin now."

The 24 year-old Lin hit New York by surprise after putting up record breaking numbers in his first seven starts last season, despite seemingly coming out of nowhere. Lin's play and affable nature led to a media frenzy, inciting the term "Linsanity."

Unexpectedly, the Knicks failed to re-sign Lin this year, instead losing him to the Houston Rockets, where his stats have dropped significantly since his start in New York, officially bringing an end to the Linsanity that really only seemed to last a couple months.

"It's still unclear what purchases led to Lin's $1.37 check, but you can be certain it was something that was 10 times the price 11 months ago," said sports marketing consultant Ian McGregor. "Perhaps a t-shirt? A jersey? Perhaps a game used jersey? It's hard to say. It could've been a lot of things with how fast his merchandise lost its value."

"I just hope his copyright proposal was approved in those first few months," continued McGregor, "otherwise I'm not sure he's made his money back. I know it costs around 40 bucks or so to file a copyright."