… and we're back. Four days off followed by three games in four night. Awesome, NBA. Awesome.

The Kings are in Las Cruces tonight to… I don't know, revel in all things Reggie? Party with college kids? Oh, that's right: Play the Dallas Mavericks in exhibition basketball! Woohoo.

Of course, the buzz in Dallas surrounds not the surely epic John Salmons/Nick Fazekas showdown, but Kobe Bryant's status. Los Angeles was abuzz with Kobe junk today, with a radio show (falsely) reporting Bean cleared out his locker and was headed to the Mavericks for Josh Howard and Jason Terry. Fun!

It all seems to be passing at this point, so I guess basketball is the only thing left to worry about. Hopefully we'll see plenty of Darryl Watkins (to get a better read) and Orien Greene (to reassert he's the choice at backup point). I also wouldn't mind seeing some of the jumpers Mike Bibby and Ron Artest fire up start to fall, but I'm not overly concerned with that.

Mostly, I want to see a fairly packed arena. The NBA should schedule preseason games in far off locales; basketball is a sport certainly improved by the live experience. No offense to New Mexico State's budding program, but Aggies-Utes isn't quite the same as Dirk-Artest.

Game time is 6 pm Pacific. Comcast has the TV side, 1140 AM on radio. Use this thread before, after and during the game to record your thoughts, jokes, and laments. And um, go Kings.