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The past offseason in the NBA made headlines for the wrong type of gambling.

All thanks to former rogue NBA referee Tim Donaghy, who was discovered to have been involved in fixing league games and the placing of bets on their outcomes.

Donaghy's damage placed the NBA in the same league as their NFL, MLB and U.S Track and Field counterparts, at the time going through their own troubles - with the Michael Vick, Barry Bonds and Marion Jones issues - in the world of controversy surrounding ethics in professional sports.

Now, the NBA is generating news for the right type of gambling. With teams making moves left and right in hopes of making a run at the title, the majority of the sports world's eyes finally seem fixated on the NBA for once.

In many ways, the NBA goes unnoticed until the playoffs. Not that that excuses things, but the NBA happens to start right in the middle of football season and baseball begins with basketball not yet on its homestretch.

Not this year. After the NBA lottery failed to reward the poor, one team after another commenced to roll the dice. The moves started and only stopped momentarily during the recently passed trade deadline last week.

Many credit the movement on the Lakers' late acquisition of all-start forward/center Pau Gasol (which had the Lakers in first place leading into Friday) from Memphis for relatively nothing - former No. 1 pick and bust Kwame Brown and roughly some pocket change - for setting off the spin cycle.

If you're really in search of the starting point then back up several months before. When the ping pong balls did not bounce in the favor of four of the worst six teams from the 2006-07 season - Boston, Memphis, Minnesota and Seattle - everything changed. All of a sudden Seattle and Minnesota decided to let their aces like Ray Allen and Kevin Garnett go and play for the future, leading to shakeups from coast to coast.

Last year's worst in the East now sports the best record as a new power sprung with Boston's new three-headed monster of Allen, Garnett and Paul Pierce. In the aftermath, nearly all other major players for the ring begin looking for just that - major players.

Before you know it, the Utah Jazz addressed one of their few weaknesses with outside shooting by acquiring hot-handed guard Kyle Korver from Philadelphia, going on an 18-3 run afterward; the Lakers landed a big wild card in Gasol, winning 10 straight before Friday's loss to Portland; and Phoenix pulled in what some call the Big Cactus, a move still being questioned.

Even being the best proved not good enough as the Phoenix Suns, who at the time sported the top record in the West when they traded perennial All-Star forward Shawn Marion for something even bigger and they hope better - Miami Heat center Shaquille O'Neal, winner of four NBA titles and three NBA Finals MVP awards.

Before you know it, even the Dallas Mavericks, winners of 67 games last year but not even a single playoff series, thought they needed to get better - going out and getting another perennial All-Star in point guard Jason Kidd, the league's active leader in career triple-doubles.

What does it all mean in the grand scheme of things?

A quick look at recent history indicates quick fixes sometimes work, and sometimes don't as in the case of current NBA power San Antonio, who has kept its core unchanged over the last five years.

Most recently, Miami acquired O'Neal from the Lakers and two seasons later won their first title in 2006 as a result. The fix indeed proved a quick one though, with Miami now without O'Neal and with the league's worst record.

Detroit won the 2004 championship after a mid-season trade that brought them Rasheed Wallace. The team the Pistons defeated in the Finals that year, the Lakers, also added key pieces in a pair of All-NBA players Gary Payton and Karl Malone that same season.

Whether this year's gambles pay off, or a team that keeps things relatively in tact while making minor tweaks like the Pistons and Spurs, takes the cake remains to be seen.

One thing's for sure, however: all attention is on the NBA this season.

Only now for the right reason.