Philadelphia 76ers

CLIPPERS VS. PHILADELPHIA When: 7:30. Where: Staples Center. On the air: Prime Ticket; Radio: 980, 1330. Records: Clippers 46-22, 76ers 26-40. Record vs. 76ers: 1-0. Update: The 76ers have the worst offense in the NBA, scoring a league-low 92.6 points per game. But the 76ers do play good defense, allowing just 96.2 points per game, the 10th-lowest figure in the league.

CLIPPERS VS. PHILADELPHIA When: 7:30. Where: Staples Center. On the air: Prime Ticket; Radio: 980, 1330. Records: Clippers 46-22, 76ers 26-40. Record vs. 76ers: 1-0. Update: The 76ers have the worst offense in the NBA, scoring a league-low 92.6 points per game. But the 76ers do play good defense, allowing just 96.2 points per game, the 10th-lowest figure in the league.

When: 3. Where: Wells Fargo Center. On the air: TV: Time Warner Cable SportsNet, Time Warner Cable Deportes; Radio: 710, 1330. Records: Lakers 10-14; 76ers 12-11. Record vs. 76ers (2011-12): 0-1. Update: Former UCLA guard Jrue Holiday is enjoying a breakout year, averaging 18.4 points and 8.9 assists in his fourth season with the 76ers. The Lakers won four consecutive games against the 76ers until a 95-90 loss in Philadelphia last season. - Mike Bresnahan

The top plays from the NBA's All-Star game invariably repeated themselves in the boy's front yard every year. As a preteen he would throw the ball off the backboard and dunk it, pretending to be Tracy McGrady. So what if the goal was only 7 feet and sometimes the kid's more athletic friends would execute the moves better than he did? He wasn't going to let anyone tell him he couldn't live his immeasurable dream. More than a decade later, Jrue Holiday will head to Houston perfectly content to be himself.

Micheal Ray Richardson, a former NBA All-Star guard, said today that he has decided to stay with his Italian basketball team rather than accept an offer from the Philadelphia 76ers. "I'm going to stay," Richardson said after talks with Paolo Gualandi, president of Knorr Bologna. "Everything is OK now. I'm happy and they're happy." A team statement said Richardson and Gualandi "reached an accord of total satisfaction for both sides."

Charles Barkley says the NBA world has been divided into a list of good guys and bad guys. Magic, Michael and Larry are on the good-guy list. He is on the bad-guy list. Barkley can't be talked out of this argument. Other superstars say the politically correct thing. Barkley says the things nobody else has the nerve to, things that cause teammates to cringe, officials to call technical fouls and reporters to delete the expletives.

Reporting from Philadelphia — They are a special duo in their own right. Reggie Evans and Kenyon Martin did all the little things that helped the Clippers defeat the Philadelphia 76ers, 78-77, Friday night. Evans had 10 rebounds, half of them offensive. He didn't score, but he played with energy and hustled throughout his 19 minutes. Martin had seven rebounds, one blocked shot and three points, and he played good defense at power forward and when he was switched over to small forward.

The Philadelphia 76ers traded forward Albert King to San Antonio for forward Pete Myers.

  There may be no compromise short of a roster overhaul that can save a divided Lakers Nation from its biggest worry heading into 2013. You know, the physical cliff. The Lakers are Paleolithic by NBA standards, with an average age of 28.4. Three of their starters are already in need of retirement-benefits advisors: Pau Gasol is 32, Kobe Bryant is 34 and Steve Nash turns 39 next month. With advancing age come not only wear-and-tear injuries (see Gasol's knees, assorted Bryant body parts)

- Andrew Bynum has some advice for Dwight Howard. Be patient with Kobe Bryant. "I think Dwight's a great player, but he's going to have to get accustomed to playing with Kobe, obviously, and not touching the ball every single play," Bynum said Sunday before the Lakers beat Philadelphia, 111-98. Bynum said Bryant helped him "tremendously" earlier in his career, but the 7-footer wanted the ball often in the post as he gradually improved as a player. It didn't always happen. "Later I thought I was able to get the ball more and do more things with the ball, so I could definitely see how at the end it could stunt growth," Bynum said.

When: 3. Where: Wells Fargo Center. On the air: TV: Time Warner Cable SportsNet, Time Warner Cable Deportes; Radio: 710, 1330. Records: Lakers 10-14; 76ers 12-11. Record vs. 76ers (2011-12): 0-1. Update: Former UCLA guard Jrue Holiday is enjoying a breakout year, averaging 18.4 points and 8.9 assists in his fourth season with the 76ers. The Lakers won four consecutive games against the 76ers until a 95-90 loss in Philadelphia last season. - Mike Bresnahan

Rory McIlroy sank a short birdie putt on the 18th hole Saturday to remain tied with Luke Donald as the world's two top-ranked golfers pulled three shots clear of a star-studded field after the third round of the Dubai World Championship in the United Arab Emirates. The top-ranked McIlroy, who has already wrapped up the European and PGA Tour money titles, struggled early when he bogeyed the first hole and missed several makable birdie putts. But he improved on the back nine, sinking a 30-foot eagle putt on 14 to go with three birdies for a six-under 66. Donald also had a 66 and is tied with McIlory with a 17-under total of 199. If Donald wins Sunday without carding a bogey, he will match the feat of Sweden's Jesper Parnevik, who won the 1995 Scandinavian Masters without dropping a shot.

Dwight Howard wore a Lakers uniform for the first time as the team held media day Monday at its practice facility in El Segundo. When Howard will wear that uniform in an actual game is another question. The center maintained he doesn't have any updated timetable on when his surgically repaired back will be sufficiently rehabilitated for him to return to the court. "I don't," Howard said. "I just want to be 100% for the season. I don't want to have any setbacks where I play a couple of games and then I have to sit down.

Nearly 3,000 miles away, Andrew Bynum seems set on a new beginning. Just before his introductory news conference with the Philadelphia 76ers, fans greeted him by shouting his name and chanting, "Beat L.A. " After acquiring Bynum last week in a four-team, 12-player trade that sent Dwight Howard from Orlando to the Lakers, Sixers officials tabbed Bynum as their future franchise player. And Bynum shared his intentions to stay with Philadelphia after his $16.1-million contract ends after the 2012-13 season.

How will the Lakers fill out the rest of their bench? It's possible the answer lies with Devin Ebanks, Jodie Meeks or both. Whoever it is, the Lakers hope they can find a backcourt player who could reduce Kobe Bryant's minutes and provide needed outside shooting. Meeks, a Philadelphia 76ers shooting guard, could fill that description since the 25-year-old shot in the high 30% range in the past two seasons. Meeks' agent, David Bauman, said Meeks is on the Lakers' radar and that of "four or five" other unspecified teams.

Sixers All-Star forward Andre Iguodala reflected on the pressures of the pro game: "I think it weighs on any basketball player when they are not playing and they think they should be playing," he said. "Some guys, they go to a vice or they go to something that not only hinders their game but it hinders their health overall. Guys can drink; guys can go to drugs. That's the part of the league that people don't see. " After Philadelphia blew past Boston, 103-71, Celtics Coach Doc Rivers was asked about the 76ers' showboating: "If I was a player and I was in and I had a 40-point lead, and I could get a dunk, I'm getting a dunk.