The Atlanta Hawks have suspended center/forward Zaza Pachulia for tomorrow night's game at Denver for conduct detrimental to the team, according to Executive Vice President and General Manager Billy Knight.

Pachulia's absence from the team will only pertain to Wednesday's game against the Nuggets, and he will be available to play at Seattle on Friday, January 25.

Atlanta Hawks guard Anthony Johnson has been suspended for one game without pay, it was announced today by Stu Jackson, NBA Executive Vice President, Basketball Operations.

Johnson was assessed a Flagrant Foul, Penalty Two and  ejected for flagrantly fouling Jose Calderon of the Toronto Raptors by striking him in the head with a forearm.

The incident occurred with 41.3 remaining in the second period of Atlanta's 89-78  loss to the Toronto Raptors on Friday, Jan. 18 at Air Canada Centre. Johnson  will  serve  the suspension when the Hawks host the Portland Trail Blazers at Phillips Arena on Jan. 21.

With Al Horford set to make his first trip to Toronto after the hard foul on T.J. Ford, Chris Bosh is hoping that Raptor fans are less forgiving towards Horford than his team has been.

"That's the nature of this business. Sometimes, even though you did do something unintentionally, I guess they [fans] act like you did it [intentionally]," said Bosh. "And I hope our fans make it tough on him tonight."

While he hopes they are unforgiving, Bosh quickly points out that Horford will not be targeted on the floor.

"It's part of the business; everyone has sent out their apologies since then, we can go on playing basketball," he said. "[Horford] is not a dirty player or anything, he's a hard-nosed guy who plays hard. He seems to be a good rookie and it's kind of tough for him, but that's the nature of this business."

Al Horford is ready for the storm that's sure to come from screaming fans Friday night when the Hawks face the Toronto Raptors at Air Canada Centre.

The Hawks' rookie center spent three years touring some of the most venomous environments in basketball during his All-American career at Florida.

So he's been in an uncomfortable place or two and handled himself pretty well.

"I've heard some pretty nasty things over the years, about myself and my family and just about anything else you can think of," Horford said. "I've never been one to play to the crowd or let them get to me, and I won't start now, no matter what's being said or done."

The ill-feelings toward Horford stem from his foul on Raptors point guard T.J. Ford late in the Hawks' Dec. 11 loss that resulted in Ford spending the night in an Atlanta hospital and Horford being suspended for a game for a flagrant foul.

During Tuesday's 104-93 loss to Atlanta, the Nuggets remained emotionally drained from the news that Nene, their teammate and friend, had a testicular tumor removed this week.

Down double-digits for the entire second half, Denver cut the lead to eight with 1:47 left. But on two consecutive inbound plays, Allen Iverson was bumped by Atlanta's Anthony Johnson, and both times there was no call ? and a turnover.

After the second turnover, the storm touched down. Iverson exploded and was promptly ejected. Center Marcus Camby escorted him off the court while he continued to scream.

Then, J.R. Smith exploded and was ejected. Camby, again, escorted a screaming teammate toward the locker room. Smith furiously threw his headband and jersey into the giddy Philips Arena stands.

"There's a lot of emotion and frustration on our team right now," said Coach George Karl, whose Nuggets are 22-15. "There are circumstances out there where, if you feel like you're getting mistreated, you burst. I can understand A.I. I don't understand what J.R. did."

Smith, who scored 21 points, slipped out of the locker room to avoid the media, but in the bowels of the arena he said, "We've got to get through it as a team. No matter what, people are going to go down, so people are going to have to step up and play."

Midway Games has named Dwight Howard as the cover athlete for its game NBA Ballers: Chosen One.

Howard plays for the Orlando Magic and will be featured on the package along with Al Horford of the Atlanta Hawks. The basketball game should be released in the first half of this year for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

For the first time since 1982, the NBA is sending two teams back to the court for a do-over.

The Atlanta Hawks and Miami Heat must replay the final 51.9 seconds of their game last month because the official scorer ruled incorrectly that Shaquille O'Neal fouled out, the league said Friday.

The Hawks won 117-111 at home in overtime Dec. 19, but strike that one from the books. For now, playoff-contending Atlanta has one less win, while the Heat have one less loss on their miserable record.

"We're human. We make mistakes," Hawks owner Michael Gearon Jr. said. "There certainly wasn't anything malicious about it. We have one of the most senior scoring staffs in the league. They're good. It happened. There's not much we can do about it."

The NBA today granted a game protest filed by the Miami Heat after its 117-111 loss to the Atlanta Hawks on December 19 at Philips Arena which will result in the replay of the final 51.9 seconds of the game?s overtime period with the Hawks leading 114-111. The replay will occur immediately prior to the next scheduled game between the two teams -- on March 8, 2008, also at Philips Arena.

The Heat protested the game because with 51.9 seconds remaining in overtime, the Hawks' scoring table personnel incorrectly disqualified the Heat's Shaquille O?Neal ? asserting that a foul committed by O'Neal was his sixth foul of the game when in fact it was only his fifth.  The error occurred because the Hawks? Official Scorer mistakenly attributed to O?Neal a foul at 3:24 remaining in the fourth period that was actually called against the Heat?s Udonis Haslem.    

NBA Commissioner David Stern found that the Hawks were grossly negligent in committing this scoring error since they failed to follow league-mandated scoring procedures and failed to respond effectively when the members of the statisticians' crew noticed the mistake.  Because of this conduct by Atlanta's personnel, Miami suffered a clear competitive disadvantage as O?Neal ? the Heat?s second leading scorer and rebounder that night ? was removed from a one-point game with only 51.9 seconds remaining.  Under this unprecedented set of circumstances, the Commissioner granted the Heat's protest and fined the Hawks $50,000 for their violation of league rules.

The protest is the first granted by the NBA since December 14, 1982, when then-NBA Commissioner Larry O?Brien upheld a protest by the San Antonio Spurs concerning their 137-132 double overtime loss to the Los Angeles Lakers on Nov. 30.  The Spurs and Lakers finished the game on April 13 with San Antonio collecting a 117-114 win.

Former NBA star Isaiah Rider was in custody Sunday on outstanding arrest warrants after Berkeley police responded to a report of a disturbance between a taxi driver and a passenger.

Officers arrived on the scene to find the passenger was Rider. They arrested him on a no-bail warrant issued by Oakland police for unlawful firearm possession and another warrant for grand theft.

Berekeley police say the basketball player, who retired in 2002, is currently in custody at the city's jail.