Hahn's NBA Insider

Keeping Karl means moving Melo

At least somebody in Denver wants to sign an extension. George Karl's representatives are in talks with the Nuggets about a three-year contract extension that would include the option of remaining as a consultant after the 2013-14 season.

On the team's website, the Nuggets acknowledged they have begun negotiating with the 59-year-old coach (and two-time cancer survivor).

On Friday night, Karl became the seventh NBA coach to earn 1,000 victories. "We've said it from Day One that George is our guy and we want him here for a long time,'' general manager Masai Ujiri said. "George is a future Hall of Famer. He has earned a contract extension.''

Let this be the first step in the process of moving forward without Carmelo Anthony in the future plans. Karl and Anthony share mutual respect publicly, but privately it's much different. The two are not at all close. Anthony mostly confided in assistant coach Tim Grgurich, who opted not to return this season.

CBSSports.com reported on Wednesday that the Nuggets' new hierarchy, which includes Ujiri and team executive Josh Kroenke, son of team owner Stan Kroenke, had reached the point where they were ready to discuss trading Anthony if he does not sign an extension before the Feb. 24 trade deadline.

Anthony can save everyone a lot of time if he goes to management now and lets them know he does not intend to sign the three-year, $65-million extension that has been on the table since the spring. The question is, will he use his leverage of agreeing to an extension as the contingency to any trade to control where he goes?

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Stirring up a Hornets nest

The Charlotte Observer's Rick Bonnell suggested last week that if the NBA-owned New Orleans franchise winds up moving once it's sold, fans in Charlotte would love it if the league would re-appropriate the nickname back to their city's franchise. The Bobcats were named basically after their first owner, Bob Johnson, who, by placing no value in modesty, bestowed the honor upon himself.

When Michael Jordan bought the franchise last spring, there was immediate talk of a name change. But the process of changing a team's name is such an arduous and expensive task - you're basically trashing millions of dollars in everything that has the old logo on it, from apparel to the arena floor and so on - that it's really a moot point.

Iron man hammers 'soft' NBA

Trail Blazers guard Andre Miller saw his streak of 632 consecutive games played - the longest active streak in the NBA - end Tuesday against Phoenix when he was suspended for essentially jack-hammering rookie Blake Griffin into the baseline last Sunday.

No foul was called on the play, but video review of the hit, which was an obvious retaliation for a shove Griffin laid on Miller at the other end of the court, resulted in the punishment.

Miller told Portland reporters he "didn't think it was something that ruled a suspension" and said he'd do it again. "It just shows you how soft the league has gotten, protecting young players," Miller said. "It's not like it was when I came in this league."

Griffin and his powerful dunks have been celebrated by the NBA, but players are starting to get annoyed with some of the things he's getting away with, whether it's using Timofey Mozgov's head as leverage for that awe-inspiring throw-down against the Knicks last month, or roughhousing under the rim battling for a rebound.

Divided by a sneaker war

Kevin Durant and Michael Beasley would be a heck of a tandem at the NBA level, so just imagine being the coach fortunate enough to have them on the same AAU roster. Durant and Beasley first met as teammates at the Seat Pleasant, Md., recreation center and an AAU team called the PG Jaguars. They were 9 years old.

"I wasn't good at all,'' Beasley told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. "All I could do was rebounds. That jump shot Kevin's got? Kevin's had that his whole life. Every time I grabbed a rebound, I'd just throw it out to Kevin.''

Both players eventually grew into high school phenoms and one-and-done college stars who were successive Big 12 Player of the Year and NBA No. 2 overall picks. But their run as teammates ended at the tender age of 13 when the reality of AAU basketball - sneaker company politics - came into play.

"He chose Nike, I chose Adidas,'' Beasley said. "Simple as that."

Pass Byron a Bud

An NBA coach has to believe in something. Byron Scott, seeing his Cavaliers team basically quit on him recently, believes it's time for a beer.

Scott had known only winning as an NBA player and three-time champion with the Lakers until he wound up with the Vancouver Grizzlies in the 1995 expansion draft. They went 15-67 in that inaugural season. Scott, 34, played in 80 games and averaged 10.2 points per game. And maybe just as many postgame beers.

"I never drank beer until I got to Vancouver and we started losing,'' Scott told the Morning Journal (Ohio). "I would stay up after games until 2 in the morning. I was like, 'I can't deal with this.' ''

Scott learned to deal with it. After going back to the Lakers the following year for his final season as a player, Scott endured a 56-loss season as a rookie head coach with the Nets in 2000-01 before success arrived along with Jason Kidd.

His first year with New Orleans, Scott was back to losing again, this time an epic 64 losses in 2004-05, the most he's ever experienced as a player or a coach, before the arrival of Chris Paul. In his first season with the Cavaliers, he's 7-15 going into the weekend. It's still a miserable experience, but losing now makes him have a greater appreciation of winning.

"It helped me to understand the difference between losers and winners,'' he said. "There's a big difference.''

Moral of the story: Losers drink beer. Winners drink champagne.