Billups has shrunk a bit. His shoulders aren't as hulking and his back and arms not as muscularly defined.

"I don't know, man, I did work out hard this summer but I weigh almost the same," he said after practice Tuesday. "There may be about five pounds different."

[...] "I didn't lift as much this summer," he said. "I did more core work, more conditioning, with the intentions of being in better shape. I have always come to camp in good shape. I always work hard in the summer. But it was different this year."

"We’re about 95 percent sold for our game telecasts right now and our pregame is 93 percent sold," said Dan Hauser, Palace executive vice president. "I expect we’ll be fully sold out within two weeks – before the season opener." [...] "The one difference this year is we’ve had more up-front buys," he said. "In the past we’ve been at about 80 percent. This year we’ll be sold out."

In all seriousness, I wonder if TV ad sales are going up because season ticket sales are going down -- a lot of fans who could afford to go to games in the past will be forced to stay home because of the economy. (It might also be related to the fact that every non-nationally televised game will be shown exclusively on FSN as opposed to TV20. Or not -- this stuff is out of my realm.)

Curry said he has 16 rules that are keys to winning. One is to leave the refs alone. That might be a tough one considering how Wallace and Rip Hamilton have been known to share an opinion or two to the officials. But Curry isn't too worried. "We just want to have rules in place so that guys know that they're held accountable for it," Curry said.

"No way on God’s green Earth can you lock me up," Wallace baited Brown. "I go hard; you lollygag." On it went. Wallace told Brown he couldn’t hang with him through all his NBA stops and told him he was lucky he didn’t go up against him in high school. When Wallace’s unit sat and Brown’s continued to scrimmage against another five, the harangue continued.

Brown, playing more and more aggressively, scored a basket.

"One basket in 3½ hours!" Wallace blared. Brown scored again. "Two baskets in 3½ hours!" came the cry. Brown scooped up a loose ball at half-court, charged to the rim and practically carried poor Cheikh Samb through the rim for another basket. "Three baskets in 3½ hours!" echoed throughout the Pistons’ practice gym.