From time to time, me and Zach Harper of TalkHoops.net discuss the goings-on about the Association over a series of emails. We started this time-honored tradition back in March and re-upped with another series during the First Round of the Playoffs. And being the trill cats that we is, we had to bring you the conclusion of this trillogy for the NBA Finals.
Below, we start off with me emailing Zach and go on to discuss all aspects of Magics/Lakers, quote some movies, debate Michael Phelps, wonder what Oklahoma City will do if there is inclement weather and reminisce the ruse that Avery Johnson did not appreciate. And if you would like to read this on a better website, head over to check out the Talkhoops version.
Enjoy.
Zachary,
Magic. Lakers. Marbles. All of em. Who you got?
After a grueling season with all the unexpected twists and turns surrounding Cleveland’s collapse, Denver’s ascension, NOLA’s decline and Boston’s pride, it is sort of refreshing to be down to just one meaningful question: Will LA’s collection of talent be enough to beat the Magic’s talented collection? To me, that’s what the NBA Finals will ultimately hinge upon: Will the Lakers talented triumvirate of Kobe, Pau and Odom* dominate enough to hold off what may be a more consistent, more unified group of less talented, less versatile players?
I imagine most people think Orlando will lose. My initial reaction is to say the same. Then again, there’s something scary about this Magic team. They have something intangible. They never seem out of a game. They can win on jumpshots alone. They play better defense than you think. They have the best rebounder in the League. They don’t truly rely on a single player to score. (They have six players who have scored at least 15 points in a game this postseason while the Lakers have only four).
People, including myself, like to harp on Superman’s lack of post moves as one of this team’s Achilles’ heels. But if he just hung 26 points and 13 rebounds per game on an immobile-yet-still-7′3″ Big Z, what is he going to do to a finesse player like Pau? Sure, they have Bynum, but does anyone expect him to be anything other than glued to the bench in foul trouble most of the Finals? And if Andrew isn’t seeing more than 15-20 mpg, leaving Dwight free to roam the paint against a post duo of Pau and Lamar, he might make the 17 rebounds per game he averaged against Perk and Big Baby in the Celtics series look like a mere appetizer. Kobe and the Lakers will certainly rule the mid-range game with their triangle offense, but if Dwight is dominating the middle and Hedo/Shard/Pietrus/JJ are owning the long-range game, will the Lakers skillful execution really be enough of an advantage for the Lakers to win?
I dunno. My brain still tells me that Los Angeles will get it done. But, in some ways, this feels a little like 2004 again. Sure, Shaq/Kobe/Glove/Mailman probably win that trophy if Karl Malone doesn’t blow out his knee, but this Orlando cast is giving off the same cohesive-if-unproven vibe that we saw from the Pistons five years ago.
Am I dumb?
Yours Truthfully,
Jared
* P.S. As far as basketball players go, I still prefer Trevor Ariza to Odom ten times out of ten, but highlighting Lamar and his wild, possibly Willy Wonka-induced inconsistency makes much more sense for the theme of this email. Also, Mousy says he stink-fingered Bunny Cote.
Ja’red,
So this is what all of the coverage, “News Fit to Six,” “Eight-Second Violations,” “10-Man Rotations,” “Weekly Fix” podcasts, morning “Cups of Coffee,” “Fundamentals” and hundreds of thousands of typed out words about trades, capes, green shoes, running versus defense, and puppets have all come down to, eh?
There are no more LeBron dunks, J.R. Smith threes, Birdman arm flaps, Shaq crossed-eyes, Chris Paul crossed defenders, or Ron Artest YouTube interviews. We don’t have LeBron versus Kobe. We don’t have Carmelo versus LeBron. Hell, we don’t even have an opportunity to judge Paul Pierce’s fake injuries against the value of Kobe Bryant’s faked friendships with teammates.
But we do have Dwight Howard and his band of merry men going against Kobe and the people he has to travel with. And I am actually a lot more excited about this than I thought I’d be.
The reason I’m excited is the exact NBA Playoff history moment that you mentioned — the 2004 NBA Finals. It really is the battle between imminent chaos and supreme cohesion. The Magic is a rowdy, fiery, bonded roster who lives and dies by that Larry Bird line and relies on the dominance of a manchild who has career averages of 17.3 points and 12.5 rebounds before the age of 24. But even the numbers aren’t as impressive as the fact that he believes he’s 20% of what he COULD be. 20%!!! Not only is he completely capable of dominating a series without a reliable post move (helps when he’s guarded by a 65-year old Lithuanian man with bad feet) but he thinks that he’s not very good while doing so.
And here’s the real kicker with him. Have we ever had a player who was not only the next big thing/great big man in the NBA while at the same time being the clear-cut best big center in basketball? He’s at the top of the playing field at his respective position and yet has nowhere to go but up. If I was ordering a player as a drink that I wanted to replicate the essence of Dwight Howard, I’d be asking for one part humility with two parts strength and three parts of ceiling-less potential and a splash of vermouth (because that seems to go in stuff, right?). I’d light it on fire, blow out the flame, and serve it to my fans with a twist of lime and a small umbrella for a little flare.
On the other hand, there’s Andrew Bynum. Pretty much the antithesis to Dwight Howard’s career. He’s been saddled with a severe knee injury for two straight years. He’s as confident as he is capable of pulling off a crossover dribble against Alvin Robertson and yet tries to exude an aura of belonging that I haven’t sensed as being as forced since I watched Mikey in Swingers try to impress a girl by saying that not only did he drive a Cavalier but that it was also red as if that was going to open the floodgates. With Bynum, he’s always a sense of rejection away from getting hammered, calling an assistant coach on the phone, and babbling incessantly into an answering machine until Brian Shaw picks up the phone and asks him to never call back.
We assume that as long as Howard can have his way inside, the Magic will overpower any defense with the mismatches and three-pointers that result from double teams. But what about stopping Kobe? We assume Mickael Pietrus will guard him but it’s not like guarding LeBron James. LeBron can be forced into being a stagnant jump shooting player if you pack it in. Kobe is too relentless and smart to allow that to happen.
So before I begin to pontificate about the possible outcome of this series I have to ask you, is Kobe Bryant facing the perfect team for him to win a title against by himself? Or will the Magic tweak what they did to beat LeBron and see if it can bottle up the Mamba?
Anticipating Thursday Night,
Zach
P.S. – You have to prepare me before you start dropping Outside Providence references like that. I nearly fried my keyboard with some Aquafina.
To Whom It May Concern,
Allusions, Zach. References are something a whore does for money…or candy.
Kobe, and really anyone in the high post, should be able to dissect this defense. We may see a record number of midrange jumpers made by one team in an NBA Finals. Between Pau on the baseline and Kobe burying contested Js right in front of any of Cort Lee, Mike Piet or H to the E-Doe, it’s going to be a 15-footer barrage all game, every game. Mamba is definitely gonna get his.
Then again, I really don’t think he will even try to win a title by himself. Much like he was during Kobe Doin’ Work, Mr. Bryant is well-aware that the world will be watching. And, sure, he’s probably still sour about the physical gauntlet that the Celtics ran him through last June that caused him to shy away from driving to the hoop, but I still think that he will do as best as he can to defer to his teammates when they can be trusted. He knows he needs those guys—particularly Lamar—to play well to win another title and cement his legacy on Mount Olympus. So I think he will definitely try to trust the other guys. But we all know his teammates will at times prove themselves untrustworthy. And in those halves, he will take over and finish the game with 35-40. But on the flipside, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a few sub-25-point/over-7-assist games from #24 either if the other guys are holding up their end of the bargain.
If you’re the Magic, that’s the last thing you want to see. You want Kobe taking bad shots, just like you mentioned with LeBron. If Stan Van Gundy is smart — and I sometimes feel like I’m the only one who really, really thinks he is — he will have Dwight spend most of his time locking down Pau (again, presuming Bynum isn’t playing too much) and then put heavy, multi-defender pressure on Kobe whenever he goes off the bounce. I mean, that’s what you have to do against LA right? Do whatever you can to stop the two All-NBA guys and make Lamar, Trevor, Andrew, Derek, Jordan, Shannon, Sasha and Luke beat you. They sound like an eight-member mediocre boy band for shit-sake; you have to challenge them to score.
Then, when Kobe predictably gets frustrated with the predictably shoddy play of his erratic posse, he’ll start forcing some bad shots. And when that happens, the Lakers become beatable. In their seven Playoff losses, Kobe shot 39.3%. In their twelve Playoff wins, he shot 50.8%. Getting Kobe to shoot poorly is half the battle. The other half? You guessed it: Frank Stallone. (Did I use that last time? Am I already recycling material over here?)
But while it’s fun to talk about Kobe, Kobe, Kobe, he’s not really the most important player in this series, now is he? For the Lakers, it all comes down to Lamar really, right? If he scores like he should be able to, the Lakers definitely win. But does anyone really think Odom will be consistent? Look at his point totals going backwards since the Utah series ended: 20, 19, 5, 8, 10, 7, 6, 8, 10, 2, 16, 7, 9. Seriously, who does that? How can your third option go eight straight Playoff games without scoring more than 10 points? It’s baffling really.
Moving on…Dwight is indeed a monster. Like you say, he’s already so good and he’s still so raw. It’s absolutely unbelievable to think how good he will get. Not could get. Will get. As a 6′, overweight, 28-year-old who nearly sprained his ankle after making a fairly uncontested lay up last night in a men’s league game, it almost pisses me off. (We’re now Playoff-bound, baby, following my season high 18/15 yesterday.)
Physically, he’s the most insane athlete on the planet. I love people who like to toss around names like Lance Armstrong or Michael Phelps for candidates as the best athlete alive. If you can honestly look at those two guys and then look at Dwight Howard and tell me there is even a discussion to be had, I probably don’t want to even be in the same room as you. As Kenny Powers would say, Dwight plays real sports, not tryna be the best at exercising. Or, because I’m an equal-opportunity allusion-er, if Dwight Howard woke up tomorrow with Michael Phelps’ athletic ability, he would jump out of a fucking window.
As Salamu Alaykum,
Dragon
Dragon,
Sprained ankle and yet, you still drop an 18/15 and grab a playoff berth? I heard Jordan played with the sniffles once but that’s some heroic shit right there. It reminds me of the time my rec league was securing a victory and just had to make free throws and run out the clock. I got the ball around half court, and the next thing I knew I was laying on the ground and being asked if I was okay. I was knocked out cold by the guy who was trying to foul me. I stepped to the line with double vision and a burgeoning migraine. Knocked them down cold. Mo Williams doesn’t have anything on me. But I’ll stop talking about my rec league war story, stop myself from talking about the time I lost on a great poker hand or when I won my fantasy baseball league.
But before I switch to basketball speak, I have to address your athleticism comparison between Dwight Howard, Michael Phelps and Lance Armstrong. I respect the hell out of what Lance can do and I’m willing to put my undying hatred for Phelps aside to recognize that he’s the best at what he does. But for crying out loud, are they really athletes? I mean, they’re really good at forms of transportation and that’s it. Lance is the best at getting from point A to point B on a bicycle against the surrendering-est competitors in the world. And Phelps is the best guy at getting from point A to point B in a liquid environment since Aquaman was a relevant superhero reference. But what they do isn’t athletics. It’s competition but it’s not athletics. I’m sure a lot of people will disagree with me on that but I fail to find the difference between what they do and what Jeff Gordon does. It’s competitive transportation that is street legal unlike your Fast and Furious contestants.
But anyway, let’s talk some more hoops.
Lamar is an interesting fellow and I’m not exactly tearing down the fourth wall here. But think about it. The guy has been high as a kite since he came into the league and I think he actually plays better that way. His best and most interesting years have been in LA whether he’s a Clip or Lake. He was fine and good in Miami but nobody was really giving a care about him on the East coast. But he had his own dealer on the West, he apparently prefers the Malibu Beach Clubs to the Eastern sands like he’s trying to win a club volleyball game with Zack Morris (I’m assuming my readers are expecting a Saved By the Bell reference and I like to accommodate all six of them whenever I can).
But what exactly does Lamar have to do? Isn’t your best bet to play Pau Gasol on Dwight, Ariza on Shard, Kobe on Hedo, Lamar on Pietrus/Cort Lee and Jordan Farmar on Jameer Nelson/Rafer Alston? Can Pau handle Dwight physically? No, not at all. But with Lamar roving around like Jackie Moon on defense, the Lakers are long enough to get out on the Orlando shooters and bother the shot. There’s a difference between Trevor Ariza Jumping Jack Flash at your long range jumper and having Delonte West trying to distract with that presumed Valtrex nemesis on his lip when he doesn’t come past your shoulders. He could help deny Dwight or double down on him quickly and allow the perimeter length and quickness to cause turnovers and bad shots. Seems like a perfect defense for the outside shooting offense of Staniel’s boys.
But there are three problems I have with assuming the Lakers are going to win this series and it involves the following:
1) You’re relying on Andrew Bynum to be competent on the biggest basketball stage in the world against the strongest man to ever walk this court.
2) The Lakers are actually quite terrible at defending the three. Orlando is quite proficient at shooting the three. The Pythagorean Transitive somethingorother tells me that this could be problematic for the Lake Show.
3) What do we make of this whole Jameer Nelson thing? I don’t know how to take it. He could be the Willis Reed of St. Joseph’s. He could be what KG was supposed to be in the playoffs this year. He could inject a sense of life and confidence that the Magic couldn’t have mustered on their own by having him knock down the first two jumpers of the series against Derek Fisher, swagger back up the court, and proclaim that he is unguaradable in a Kobe-mocking way. But then again, couldn’t he be neutralized by a confident Jordan Farmar? Jam On It hasn’t played in four months. He’s not in game shape no matter how good Kelly Dwyer tells me he looks in practice. He can get by against Derek Fisher but if Jordan Farmar is right, it’s almost unfair to Orlando fans to have to watch that.
What say you, Dragon?
L’Haim,
Coach Harper
Nighthawk,
I forgot that you are now Coach Harper. How is the pride of Sacramento JV basketball looking this year?
Given that you know a bunch about basketball, you were probably going to be decent at this whole endeavor anyway. But more importantly, the name Coach Harper should instill a lot of confidence among the burgeoning yutes you will be instructing. It sounds a lot like Coach Carter, and while I haven’t actually ever seen that movie because it looks like the same nonsensical, melodramatic tale of urban empowerment that can be seen in such cinematic marvels as Finding Forrester or Dangerous Minds, the writers at least blessed Samuel L. Jackson with a good name. (Was that flick actually any good? You’ve seen every basketball movie ever right?)
I think that whole name thing is pretty important. Everyone expects a Coach Knight, Coach Riley or Coach Sloan to be great, but it really shows how good guys are when they can overcome harder-to-sell names like Coach Krzyzewski, Coach D’Antoni or Coach Of The Black. Within this NBA Finals, Coach Jackson is obviously solid, but I’m not sure exactly where Coach Van Gundy falls. At this point, it’s sort of hard to separate the name itself from the unadulterated awesomeness that is the Brothers Jeff and Stan, so I can’t even call it objectively. (Side note: Can you please promise to never where a mockneck t-shirt under a blazer while on the sidelines? I don’t even need a tie, but just put on a collar would ya?)
Sometimes you just know a coach is doomed from the beginning. Coach Ivaroni? Good luck with that one, dude. I will pay $20 to the person who can find me video of Rudy Gay pronouncing that guy’s name correctly. And I like the young guy in Miami a lot, but the jury is definitely not in on whether or not Coach Spoelstra can overcome the fact that his last name rhymes with a synthetic potato chip oil that had to be discontinued after people, for some reason, complained that it caused anal leakage.
But I digress.
You also mentioned Lance the biker and Phelps the swimmer and in so doing you elegantly articulated my sentiments on the matter. Essentially, it comes down to the fact that there are two different types of things that people are talking about when they say someone is athletic: Physical feats of repetitive motion or athletic feats of prowess in sports.
These things should never be confused. Running a marathon is a physical feat of repetitive motion. Bench-pressing 350 lbs a dozen times is a physical feat of repetitive motion. The ability to instantaneously cutback from a roving linebacker’s pursuit is an athletic feat of prowess in sports. Catching a bounce pass on the wing, reversing direction with a spin dribble into the lane and then catapulting your body into the air to assault a seven-footer with posterized embarrassment is an athletic feat of prowess. Lance Armstrong can do the bike thing better than anyone ever, but he should never be confused with Barry Sanders. Michael Phelps is a borderline dolphin, but he should never be confused with LeBron James.
To me, golf is more of a sport than swimming or cycling. At least in golf the repetitive motion of swinging a club is different each time and you have to continually react to a changing landscape. Of course, when Tiger leisurely walks up to a ball in the rough and has to react to ever-changing wind speed, obstacles and pin positions it’s not exactly Walter Payton reacting to Ronnie Lott filling the B gap, but there is a lot more to a round of golf than there is a 200-meter individual medley. Maybe if Phelps had to swim in the 12-foot swells off the North Shore of Oahu or had to confront a school of piranha it would be different. But if your biggest challenge other than trying to go fast is staying in between the lane buoys, I’m not sure that counts as a sport.
Speaking of piranhas, how is it that we have teams in our Association named the Heat, the Magic and the Thunder but not a single one called the Pittsburgh Piranhas? As much as I love Dwyane Wade, the fact that a team that doesn’t end in “s” won an NBA Championship still bothers me. There are hundreds of good s-pluralized names left from the animal kingdom alone and we really have a team called the Thunder? Even some lame crap like the the Oklahoma City Orges or the Otters or the Orangutans would be better. Or why not bring back the Oilers? Or just go can’t-miss with the Tigers, the Devils or the Bears. Why isn’t there a professional sports team called the Rhinos? Originality should not trump logic and decades of proud pluralized name tradition. And none of the Thunder, the Heat or the Magic are even tangible nouns either. What were you planning to do about a mascot? No wonder Orlando and Okay City have such dumb logos. The stupidity of the dunces who settled on these team names is just staggering and it probably represents the only non-Trevor Ariza reason that I would enjoy watching the Magicians lose badly.
Speaking of Orlando, I should probably at least pretend to give some more insight on the Finals. You brought up what to me will be the most interesting thing to watch: How will these teams guard each other’s big men?
Andrew Bynum complicates the whole thing. From the Lakers standpoint, it makes sense to start Bynum as they have been doing because Pau will get dunked on by Dwight at least 12 times per night. Now, Bynum is not Bill Russell neither, but he is bigger, stronger and more physical, and can presumably at least lean on the big fella to keep him from getting any position he wants.
But if the Lakers do put Bynum on Dwight then that means Pau is supposed to stop Rashard on the perimeter? Ummm, yeah, that’s not happening.
So wouldn’t it make more sense for Phil to just concede that Dwight is unguardable by everyone and just put Pau on him anyway so he can go small by putting Lamar on Shard? You never want to make reactionary changes to what you do just for match-up purposes, but sometimes you just have to do what makes sense. Put Pau on Dwight. Put Lamar on Shard. Put Ariza on Turk. Put Kobe on Lee. And put Fish on Rafer/Jameer (although I’m not convinced that Nelson should even bother suiting up at all).
Then again, if the Lakers just go Bynum/Pau/Ariza/Kobe/Fish as scheduled, it does present just as big of a problem for the Magic. Rashard Lewis is supposed to guard Pau? Riiiiight. Let me know how that works out. My prediction: Comedy.
Putting Hedo on Ariza and Lee/Pietrus on Kobe should be fine, but the fact that Rashard is a SF playing in a PF’s body really makes this whole match up thing interesting— especially when the Magic’s only other bigs are Marcin Gortat and Tony Battie and the Lakers only other big after Bynum/Pau is DJ Mbenga. (I’m not counting Lamar.) Have we ever seen this many teams without a surplus of disposable bigs on the bench? The Celtics had the same issue. I guess the days of keeping a few Joe Kleines, Rasho Nesterovics, Greg Fosters or Will Purdues around for good measure are truly over. I can’t be the only one disappointed about that. The token white seven-footer: Just another casualty of the Sixth Extinction.
I wish I had more insight on Jameer, but I don’t. He can’t be very good right now though. He’s not a great shooter to begin with and while his floorgeneralability really impressed me earlier this year, it’s not like he’s going to jump right back into the offense and start orchestrating things that much better than Rafer. I suppose it would help out Orlando to give Anthony Johnson’s minutes to Jameer and there may be some uplifting aspect to it for the team, but I just don’t see his presence on the court being much of a difference maker.
Then again, I never thought Nelson was going to any better than a middling point guard in this League as recently as eight months ago…so what do I know?
You Know What’s Good for Shoulder Pain?,
J-Weighed
Hambone,
Know that the pride of Sacramento JV basketball is looking good. It’s looking real good. We don’t have very good athletes, even for JV. We don’t have exceptional height by any means and we’ll probably be shorter than just about every team we face. But we do have one thing that just can’t be beat. We have smart kids who know how to play the game of basketball. Now, they aren’t exactly John Stockton level basketball IQs patrolling the floor. But for their level, they’re really skilled and fairly knowledgeable of what they need to do on the court. And I have to say that I’m completely hooked on this coaching endeavor. I can’t imagine myself NOT coaching and it’s only been three weeks. Hell, I’m not even the head coach; I’m the assistant and I can’t get enough of it.
I have yutes looking up to me and asking for my help or my method for fixing their shooting form, dribbling style, and technique on running a pick and roll. And I have to think that a big part of that respect is because of the name. I’m not going to lie; Coach Harper is a hell of a name. Ron Harper could start coaching the Kings tomorrow and have them in the NBA Finals just based off of his name. Mike Dunleavy isn’t a bad coach. He’s a mediocre coach with a terrible name. Coach Curry in Motown is doomed for failure because nobody is going to say that name and take the organization seriously. Some names command thoughts of Rudy Gay outtakes for the jumbotron. Some names command thoughts of anal leakage causes. And some names command thoughts of a level of respect that any retail assistant manager can only dream of having. And I have my parents to thank for that.
As for Coach Carter, I have to say I’m a big fan. Everything you’ve stated about your assumptions of it being “the same nonsensical, melodramatic tale of urban empowerment that can be seen in such cinematic marvels as Finding Forrester or Dangerous Minds” are completely true. But there are two things that get you past that to invest in the story and enjoy the movie. 1) It’s based on a true story and fairly accurate too. That’s always a good starting point. If I knew that Sunset Park was 15 years removed from being a true happening, I would have been much more interested in it. Instead, I was confused by the fact that Rhea Pearlman was walking around with a hairstyle that replicated armpit hair. And 2) before the movie was shot, they put the actors into a basketball program to make sure that they looked the part on the court. There was actual real basketball that was light years ahead of the abomination that was Leo DiCaprio on the court in Basketball Diaries. You have those two elements and you can make any basketball movie work. Just like in Eddie.
You bring up excellent points about bad team names and what constitutes an activity qualifying as a sport. I don’t doubt that riding your bike through the mountains for two weeks is a difficult thing to do. But chess can be equally as grueling in a completely different way. Just because something is hard doesn’t mean that it quantifies calling it a sport. Playing checkers with the difficulty all the way up on my iPhone app can be pretty damn intensive and cause a level of focus and strategy that only an Army General could appreciate. Just because I happen to play it from time and time and break a sweat doesn’t mean that I’m going to start lobbying for it to be an Olympic event.
As for team names, I’ll never comprehend why naming a team after the least impressive form of weather is more awe-inspiring than the Atlanta Braves naming their mascot after a fearsome Native American warrior who’s wielding a tomahawk across the chest of the uniform. That isn’t offensive to me. What’s offensive is knowing that their are three giant communities of fans in the NBA who have no idea how to structure a sentence with verb and numerical agreement while they try to write about their favorite basketball team.
What I love about this NBA Finals is that it WILL involve a ton of coaching and tweaks in order to come up with the final result. In the past, a lot of years you were able to just roll the ball out onto the court and let the talent speak for itself. But this year, there are more mismatches than a five-year old’s outfit after they dress themselves for school. For the Lakers, they have to decide what mismatch can do more damage for them as opposed to against them. If they go big with Bynum guarding Howard and Pau guarding Shard, it’s going to turn into a mismatch on both ends. Pau can’t stick Shard on the perimeter, which leaves open the opportunities for three-point hail storms. On the other end, Pau will annihilate Shard in the post. Does Phil Jackson trust Pau to shoot 60% from the field while keeping Shard to under 40% from three? I don’t know that you can run that risk in case it’s the one time that the odds go against you.
Instead you have to go small, only it’s not anything like Don Nelson tricking Avery Johnson to change their philosophy. The Lakers are a team with multiple identities. They win with big play. They win with small ball. They win with defense and with offense. They can come at you on the runway with more than just Blue Steel. They have every trick in the bag and it often leads to them pulling their underwear out of their pants without dropping trou while the opponent’s left with a self-inflicted wedgie/melvin and a loss. But is their small better than Orlando’s normal?
Before I end up giving my final take and prediction on this series, I’ve got to know exactly where you stand and the reason’s you stand for it. Predictions are contrite, tired, and essentially meaningless. But with a maximum of just seven games left in this season, now is as good as time as any to say what you think will happen.
What say you, chief export of Maine?
Anticipatorily,
Zach
Best Friend One to Best Friend Two,
That Don Nelson tricking Avery Johnson thing is exactly why I’m not sure if Phil should alter the starting lineup at all. Obviously, you need to tweak your rotations depending on your opponent, but changing the starters is quite the concession (particularly if you do it midway through the series since it seems Coach Jackson is definitely going with Bynum tonight).
As for a winner, I really have no idea.
Aside from the Lakers last year and the Pistons in 2004, I can’t recall ever being wrong about who will win a Finals in my adult life. That’s one of the main reasons I like the NBA more than every other League. In football, with its one-and-done playoff system, there are inevitably times when the league champion is not the best team. I don’t think that even the most ardent Giants fan thinks that Eli and company could have beaten the Patriots three times our of five. Baseball does have a seven-game series, but you also have situations where an out-of-his-mind Josh Beckett allows only 8 hits and strikes out 19 in 16 innings over four days. As a Red Sox fan, I would never discount Beckett’s Playoff cajones, but his 2003 World Series performance still represents somewhat of a sustained anomaly that may have swung that series to the overall less talented Marlins. In the NBA, you rarely have a case where the Champion was only the best team in the world for that particular day or for that particular two-week period. Almost always, the winner is undisputedly the best team in the League.
And, usually, that fact is already clear before the Finals even begin. Since I’ve been watching, the NBA Finals has been less of a contest and more of a coronation. We fully expected MJ to beat the Mailman and we celebrated Mike as he did it. Same with Shaq’s Lakers. Same with Timmy’s Spurs.
But this year, I don’t think too many objective people think either team is going to dominate the other. Obviously, Vegas has the Lakers as big favorites. And the most common “expert” predictions I’ve seen from media members is “Lakers in 6.” But I don’t think too many people would see an Orlando win as a Buster Douglas moment. I dunno. Maybe I’m overrating the Magic.
If you really need my guess, I’ll take the Lakers — mainly based on the fact that it’s really hard to see Kobe letting his team lose two consecutive Finals. But then again, I can also see Dwight Howard saying this after he puts up 42/28 in Game 1 tonight: “It’s zero hour, JA Adande. I’m the first best center in the NBA. I’m sick of playing second fiddle. I’m always third in line for everything. I’m tired of finishing fourth. Being the fifth wheel. There are six things I’m mad about. And I’m taking over.”
The comical part of this whole thing — and the reason everyone should take both my and everyone else’s prediction with a grain of salt — is that the team we were expecting to coronate this week was the Cavs. I went so far as to joke around about a Cleveland pulling a Fo’, Fo’, Fo’ in the Eastern Conference before the Boston/Orlando series even finished. (What I mean by that is that the Cavs were going to go 4-0, 4-0 and 4-0 in their first three series regardless of whether they played the Celtics or the Magic).
Now the consensus seems to be that the team that just not only defeated but destroyed the unsinkable Cavs stands little chance against the clearly flawed Lakers. I can’t say I’m surprised that our collective sports world conscience no longer has any self-awareness of where it stood just two weeks ago, but even if you understandably want to blame Cleveland’s failings on a disgusting performance by Mo Williams and a “what happened to these guys?” front court, the fact remains that the Magic just kicked the tar out of a team that we all thought was very, very good. A team that won 66 games.
What it all comes down to is that I have no clue. And that’s the best thing I could have asked for from this year’s Finals.
How about you? Any stronger feelings one way or the other? Am I just a pansy?
Over and Out,
Jared
Co-Chairman of the Catalina Wine Mixer,
I couldn’t agree more that this may be the most evenly matched NBA Finals that I’ve ever seen, other than the Orlando/Houston series in ‘95, which was probably the most competitive and even sweep in NBA history. That series came down to two extremely close first games that if Orlando wins one of those, it probably goes seven. The confusion sets in because of the enigmatic Lakers. If they hadn’t been blown out in Game Six of the Finals last year, I’d be crowning them as the definite champions this year and chalking last year up to Boston just being better. But I sense a weakness in these guys mentally that keeps me from believing in them.
Does that mean that I believe in Orlando more? Not necessarily. It just means that Kobe Bryant has been blown out in elimination games to an embarrassing degree twice in the past few post-seasons. And that’s alarming to me. I usually agree that switching what you do is a terrible strategy to implement in a playoff setting, especially in the Finals. You should be doing what got you to this point and trying to do it better than you did it before. But there’s also the ideal of let the star do what he wants on the other team and shut down his help. Look at what Orlando did in defending LeBron last series. They allowed him to run amuck while taking every form of help away from him. So he ended up with insane numbers and a Gone Fishin’ photo on TNT’s post-game show. Now, while the numbers are cute and sexy, they mean nothing to me because those numbers didn’t lead to four wins. Is that fair? Not at all. Is it reality? Absolutely.
So why wouldn’t Phil Jackson go small to create impossible mismatches in the triangle offense and on the other end defend the three with your best perimeter guys? Yes, he’s adjusting what the Lakers do well but at the same time, he’s taking away Dwight’s help. Say he goes for 42/28 tonight but Lewis, Turk, and the rest of the gang shoots around 30% from three and can’t get a single clean look? To me, that leads to a Lakers double digit win while leaving us impressed by Dwight’s physical maturity and disappointed by the supporting cast around him. And that’s how adjusting to the other team works in this situation.
As far as my thoughts on the outcome of this series?
I guess the best way for me to decide who we coronate this month is to relate the two stars of the series to protagonist and antagonist in Finding Forrester, my favorite movie. Dwight Howard is easily Jamal Wallace in this series. He’s young. He’s physically impressive for his age and advanced past the other kids. He’s charming when he needs to be. He’s smarter than he lets on. He’s got a mentor who’s been there before even though that mentor has both impressed his fans and left them wanting much more. Dwight has spouted off against authority as well in order to prove that he demands more from those in charge of his development. Just like there was a question in Jamal’s writing of where it was taking him, there are similar questions in Dwight’s game of where his talent is taking him. Perennial All-Star is a lock. But is true and utter all-time greatness going to be the final destination for him?
That leaves Kobe as the antagonist in this story. I’ve never seen a player in any sports history that embodied F. Murray Abraham’s character in Finding Forrester like Kobe Bryant does. The similarities are almost too uncanny. Both are jealous of those in their respective fields who have been more successful. But it isn’t a malicious jealousy. It’s just hopeful jealousy that they would love to be held in that regard someday. F. Murray wanted to write the next great American novel and was frustrated by his inability to get people to accept his work. And Kobe Bryant is definitely that way when it comes to Michael Jordan’s mystique. Both are arrogant and confident. Both like to show how great they are at what they do. But both leave those around expecting and ultimately wanting more.
So it comes down to the battle between the two. Can Dwight Howard go up against Kobe like Jamal challenged his teacher? Personally, I feel like the hero and person that the audience wants to win often does in these types of stories. Nobody likes an unhappy ending when it’s a young person struggling to get his foot into the door of potential greatness. Nobody wants F. Murray Abraham to get the best of Jamal. And Jamal is too cunning to lose the battle.
It goes against all logic and how I feel about the current state of the NBA. But I’ll take Dwight’s strength over Kobe’s talent. Give me the Magic. I’m not confident in that pick but it makes sense in my warped consciousness.
Enjoy the games and I’ll see you in New York next week. [Ed Note: Zach, and many other prominent sports bloggers, will is headed to my city on June 13 for the Hugging Harold Reynolds hosted Blogs with Balls conference, where dozens of folks from blogs like Deadspin, FreeDarko, and FanHouse as well as real, professional journalists that work for actual newspapers will be converging to discuss the world of internet sportswriting. Tickets are still available I think. Check the website for more info. I will also be there, but for some reason the powers that be have opted to not promote that fact.]
Sincerely,
Zach
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