Denver Nuggets guard J.R. Smith continues the name changing celebrity trend, he's emphasized  that he wants to be referred to as 'Earl Smith'.

His given name is actually Earl Smith III, but J.R. caught on as people would refer to him as "junior" when he was young. That alone is odd just because he's a 3rd generation Earl. Now that he's back to being Earl Smith III, he's catching 3-point references. "I just felt like changing it", said Smith, who is playing in tonight's Denver Nuggets-Chicago Bulls game looking to add to Denver's 5-2 record. This will be Smith's first action in the regular season as he's coming off a 7-game suspension after he was charged with reckless driving in the death of his friend Andre Bell after a car crash in 2007. "It's been a long time, and J.R. has no significance to my name. My name is Earl, so I figured why not?" No this isn't some corny fresh start ploy, it just seemed like a logical thing for him to do apparently (which I'm sure we can all respect).

If he does start having shooting woes, Earl claims he'll change it back to one of his other nicknames, "Swish." Smith averaged 15.2 points per game last season on a championship contending team that looks to improve on their defeat to the Lakers in last summer's postseason. Earl is sporting #5  which he wore in the preseason where he teamed up well with new addition Ty Lawson. So it looks like Mr. Smith has made a lot of changes, now let's work on that image on and off the court.