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NBA Playoffs: Thunder and Lakers Show You How Not To Play The 1-8 Matchup

April 18, 2010 in by with 1 Comment

This was one of the most frustrating games I’ve ever watched and I’m not even a fan of either team. So I can only imagine what it was like for Lakers and Thunder fans.

For a while, it looked like the Lakers were going to do what we all expected them to do. They were punishing the Thunder inside. They were trying to teach them a lesson. The lesson was “we’re happy for you that such a young team was able to make huge improvements, win 50 games, get Matt Moore cake and be one of the most surprising defensive teams in the league but we’d like to show you that none of that means anything unless you’ve got size and power and we’re going to show you that we have size and power.”

Here is essentially the first quarter reenacted by our friends from It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia – Mac and Dee.

(NSFW – language)

The Thunder were just getting abused inside by Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum and there was nothing OKC could do about it. Sure, Nick Collison and Serge Ibaka were able to do decent jobs on the Lakers’ bigs in stretches during this game but when the Lakers concentrated on pounding the ball inside, it was complete domination.

But the Lakers weren’t content on their steady dose of playoff basketball they kept giving to the Thunder. They were intent on trying to knock down bad shots. Derek Fisher took A LOT of shots early and it almost seemed like it was by design. I felt like they were messing with OKC by saying, “we know we can beat you so we’re going to let this guy shoot for a while.” And this has been my problem with the Lakers all season long. We know they can dominate and we think they should dominate. But they keep making things harder for themselves. They keep taking bad shots instead of going out and getting much easier shots.

They had 14 points in the paint in the first quarter. The Thunder had 13 points total. And yet, the Lakers finished with just 34 points in the paint. They had 20 points in the paint at halftime. However, they just wanted to shoot jumpers, make threes and show off their skills. Sometimes, all the skill in the world doesn’t mean anything if you don’t have power.

The Thunder on the other hand must have seen the Lakers interior presence on offense and had it scare them away when they were trying to score because all they did early on was take bad jumpers. It wasn’t until Russell Westbrook realized that he had a corpse in a Derek Fisher jersey guarding him that the Thunder really started attacking the basket. At a certain point, it looked like Westbrook was intent on having some layup practice because he was relentless in attacking the hoop.

With this Lakers team, that’s what you have to do. Slap them in the face and let them know you’re probably going to be here for a while so they might as well take you seriously. Yes, Andrew Bynum is too big for the Thunder. Yes, Pau Gasol is too skilled for the Thunder. Yes, Kobe and Odom can get inside seemingly whenever they want. So what?

The Thunder needed to realize much earlier they should attack the basket. Perhaps it was first playoff game jitters for this team. I’m not quite sure what the problem was. But you could tell Westbrook was often the only guy who wasn’t afraid to mix it up a little.

Sadly, the most intimidated person on the court seemed to be Kevin Durant. I don’t know if Ron Artest was whispering disturbingly illegal things into his ear when they were standing next to each other but something rattled Durant. He tried to persevere through it by getting himself to the free throw line. After all, he got there 11 times. However, Ron’s defense was pretty spectacular in taking away Durant’s strengths on the court.

Durant was almost always out of rhythm on his jumper and having to take a contested shot. Artest was physical. He was rough. He hounded him constantly and always made contact with Durant whether he had the ball or not. A couple of times, it backfired with the way Durant gets you to get your arms in the way of his so he can go up for a jumper and initiate a foul on his defender. When he wasn’t doing that, Ron made life difficult. I don’t really blame Durant for it either. He was too passive for his team’s good but he didn’t necessarily shy away from taking shots. He just wasn’t in rhythm. He settled for a lot of much deeper shots than you’d like. He needed to get things going towards the basket and instead was forced into settling.

The weird thing about this game is you’d look at the low score from two decent offensive teams and expect it to be a sloppy affair. I think it was just poorly executed and a little lazy in the efforts by both teams. Both teams actually took good care of the ball. There were not a lot of poor dribbling displays or bad passes. Just rushed shots that were far more difficult than they needed to be. You should never have a Lakers game in which Ron Artest and Derek Fisher combine for 23 shots (7/23 overall).

I’m just disappointed that it took so long for the Thunder to see they belonged on the court with the Lakers. You’d like Russell Westbrook to take control early from what we saw and prove to his team that they can hang. He’s that type of player with a strong personality. He’s not afraid of anybody. Unfortunately for him, he was being too much of a point guard and not assertive enough. I’d expect him to go on a tear for the rest of the season in a similar way to what we saw when the Thunder were playing well.

And I’m disappointed in the Lakers for not sticking to what was working and just letting Bynum and Gasol dominate. Bynum was fierce. He realized he was the biggest and strongest guy on the court early and stepped up to the challenge of breaking the will of the opponent. But the Lakers wouldn’t let him continue his feats of strength. Andrew only took ten shots in the game and only had four attempts in the second half. Bynum and Gasol combined for 32 points, 25 rebounds, and seven blocks.

In the next game, some things need to change:

- First, the Thunder need to get Kevin Durant in motion. He’s essentially a wide receiver who is getting jammed at the line and needs to find a way to get some room to operate. For the first half of next game, I’d put him in motion and treat him like Reggie Miller running off of screens. With his jumper, he can be deadly coming off of curls and double screens along the baseline. He’ll square up his jumper and use his height to make it virtually indefensible. This will get Artest off his back and allow him plenty of breathing room. If the Lakers jump out on the screen, it can leave a slip to the basket by the screener and get some easy scoring opportunities for Green, Ibaka, etc.

Once you can get Durant in a rhythm with his jumper, the rest of the talent will take care of itself. The Lakers will either have to double team and deal with a disadvantage in the middle of the floor or keep the single coverage and let Durant carve up the perimeter. I think the more attention that has to be shown to Durant, the more likely you can find scoring space for Jeff Green and Nenad Krstic for mid-range jumpers. I doubt the Thunder shooters will continue to struggle with wide-open looks.

- Second, the Lakers need to get Kobe on the low block and allow him to dissect the defense more. I’m talking more cutters, more screens away from the ball and more patient post moves like the first one he put on Russell Westbrook in this game. He was so patient and just waited. He faked the fadeaway jumper a couple of times before going into the deep post, pump-faking again and then scoring over Green. Kobe can do that whenever he wants. I’d like to see it more.

- I want Jeff Green to see what Lamar Odom does and try to copy him. Green should be driving and dishing a lot more. He’s so versatile. I don’t think he should be settling for jumpers quite as much.

- The Lakers need to push the tempo off the long jumpers they’re forcing the Thunder to miss. Two fast break points is a horribly low numbers, especially since the Thunder are so bad at transition defense. Lakers need to look for easier points.

Overall, both teams can’t really be proud of this game. The Lakers held their serve at home so they get to take the win but they can’t be happy with the way they played and the way they couldn’t put the Thunder away. The Thunder should be of the mindset that the playoff jitters are out and now it’s time to play some basketball.

NBA Playoffs: Denver Nuggets Offense Asphyxiates The Jazz Will To Score

April 18, 2010 in by with 1 Comment

It was suffocating.

Normally, this is how you would describe how great teams play in the playoffs. In 2008, the Celtics defense was suffocating. In 2004, the Pistons defense was suffocating. In 2003, 2005, and 2007 the Spurs defense was often suffocating. It’s just what great teams do when they’re marching their way through the playoffs. But that’s not how this Nuggets team put away a banged up Jazz team in the first game of this series.

The Nuggets offense was absolutely suffocating in the fourth quarter. There was no way the Jazz were going to be able to escape it. So often, you wonder what the hell a team can do to stop an elite offense when it’s clicking. But in this game, I kept wondering if the Jazz were going to be able to get away from the bombardment of three-pointers and scores inside.

This series isn’t going to be won on defense because there’s just simply not enough of it to go around. The defense in this series can’t compete with the offensive firepower. To worry how the Jazz are going to stop the perimeter onslaught of the Nuggets just doesn’t make a lot of sense. The real thing to figure out is how you can keep scoring. Against another team, you worry about defending the other team’s offensive sets. In this series, the Nuggets and Jazz just want to keep scoring and try to end up with the final run of the game.

The Jazz looked to be uncomfortable with the way the game was headed but completely unable to do anything about it. Deron Williams gave it a valiant effort. He finished with great numbers and had 20 points and nine assists in the second half alone. But he’s got to have a better option to guard Carmelo and JR Smith other than Kyle Korver. He can’t have Wesley Matthews on the court for 38 minutes and finish with only six points.

When the game is going that way, it sucks the air right out of the Jazz’s lungs. It overwhelms you completely.

It’s just suffocating offense. You can only be consumed by it.

Playoff Paroxi-Notes

- Let’s talk about that fourth quarter for a minute. The Nuggets put up 38 points in the fourth quarter of a playoff game. No big deal. They were on the verge of dropping game one and home court advantage and they responded by scoring 38 points. That means something. It means they’re good offensively and have guys that will stick daggers in your like Danny Trejo in Desperado. Carmelo Anthony was throwing daggers. JR Smith was throwing sabres. And Chauncey Billups even performed a little acupuncture with his three to push the lead from 11 to 14.

Carmelo Anthony and JR Smith combined for 30 of the Nuggets 38 points. But it wasn’t some beautiful display of offense that made you think that these guys were just in a rhythm. It was forceful and exuberant scoring. It was the equivalent of slapping a wild predator in the jungle and then staring it right in the face. It was mean-mugging with your offense. Carmelo scored on jumpers and layups. JR Smith scored by holding a H-O-R-S-E competition.

My theory on how to stop JR Smith for the rest of the series is to completely ignore him. He wants attention. He wants it badly and he knows how to get it. He feeds off the frustration defenders show from him hitting these insanely quick threes. But what if you ignore him the entire game? Don’t even look at him when he’s shooting. Don’t pay attention to him when he has the ball. Only look at him through your peripherals. Wouldn’t that get him to stop peacocking on the court?

- When I previewed this series, I talked about how health was going to play into the outcome of this series. Melo rolled his ankle but was still able to play and play well. Mehmet Okur took a bad step and went down with an Achilles injury. He didn’t come back into the game. After the MRI, I suspect we won’t see him the rest of this post-season. Andrei Kirilenko is apparently going to miss two weeks and he was the only chance of containing Carmelo. And see what Carmelo did without AK to whisper long prose Russian poetry in his ear to distract him on his jumper?

- Are we sure that Carlos Boozer and Paul Millsap get things done? I know they had nice stats. They combined for 34 points, 18 rebounds, seven assists and six blocks. But what exactly did they do in this game? They plodded along and made sure to fill out the box score. But they didn’t stop the Nuggets from scoring inside (52 points in the paint). They didn’t provide any crunch time scoring when the Jazz desperately needed to keep up (combined seven points on six shots in the fourth). And looking ahead, if they don’t have Kirilenko or Okur the rest of this series, how can they possibly hang with the big men of Denver? Can they even hang with Chris Andersen? I just don’t see them doing anything.

- So where do the Jazz go with their frontcourt from here? You can’t play Kostas Koufos at all. He’s not good. Put him against Nene, look away for a second and then look back and you’ll see Nene eating a gyro. Can you really trust Kyrylo Fesenko to do anything? I feel like Kenyon Martin will steal his lunch money and force him to act as an ottoman whenever he feels like lounging. So you have to roll with Boozer and Millsap while praying that Fesenko can match Chris Andersen when he comes into the game.

The one thing you can do is have Fesenko unleash one big dunk. He can be good for that when the other team is least expecting it. But it’s wasted in a road game. It has to be at home. In this series, if the Jazz go back to Utah down 0-2, will it be too late?

NBA Playoffs Preview: 5) Utah Jazz Vs. 4) Denver Nuggets (The Trailer Looks Great)

April 16, 2010 in by with 4 Comments

Let me preface this by saying I’m a sucker for a good trailer.

If you want me to get excited about an upcoming movie release and you want my money to support said movie then you’re probably going to need to have produced a gripping trailer when you’re advertising this cinematic event.

It doesn’t even really need to be THAT good of a movie when it comes out. All you need to do is get me in the mood to see it and I’ll have a hard time finding ultimate failure in a movie. The last time I can remember being psyched by a quality trailer and just horrified by the finished product of a movie was with Righteous Kill. That was just an atrocious movie. The script was bad. The acting was bad. In fact, Robert De Niro and Al Pacino were so bad in the movie that I walked away thinking, “You know – 50 Cent is NOT that bad of an actor.”

The trailer doesn’t even have to be that gripping now that I think about it. It just needs a nice buildup before you unleash a certain song in the trailer that I’ve subconsciously wanted to listen to. With Righteous Kill, they brought me in with Please To Meet You by The Stones. With Brooklyn’s Finest, they brought me in with Run This Town by Jay-Z and Rihanna.

And with The Departed two songs drew me in – Gimme Shelter by the Stones and Shipping Up To Boston by Dropkick Murphys. Perhaps the two-song whammy is the reason I could never find that much fault with this movie. When I go back and watch it, it’s not terribly good. The accents are… interesting. The acting by Jack Nicholson is like watching Vince Carter in his final days of being a Toronto Raptor. And some of the dialogue is just perplexing. However, I still enjoy it thoroughly because of the music involved and my self-brainwashing going into the movie.

This is kind of how I feel about this Nuggets-Jazz series. I’m sold on the soundtrack. The dulcet tones of Chauncey Billups and Deron Williams trying to Bobby Fisher each other are enough. But you’ve also got the beautiful dance number of Carmelo Anthony’s offensive game playing over the inconsistency of his past playoff performances. I can get swept away in the cacophonous beats of JR Smith, Kenyon Martin, and Carlos Boozer all trying to endear their way of existing to us.

I mean this is just a murderer’s row of personalities, subplots and issues that will be playing on a consistent loop throughout the entire series. Regardless of how it plays out, I know that I’m sold on it. There could be four, five, six or seven atrocious games and I’ll be locked in based on the most superficial aspects of this series.

When you look at these two teams, they’re almost identical. They’re both very good offensive teams. They shoot the ball well. They get to the free throw line. They’re pretty decent defensively while challenging shots and forcing misses at almost the same rate of efficiency.

In fact, I don’t know that you could have a more evenly matched first round opponent in this year’s playoffs. So what does it come down to?

Simplicity.

What is the simplest way for each team to win games?

Here’s what we know about the Utah Jazz. They score the hell out of the ball and do so by getting a nice balance of inside-out scoring. They’re one of the top teams in the league in terms of scoring around the basket (63.5%, Fifth in the NBA) with the highest percentage (63.7%) of baskets around the basket coming from assists. They also shoot the ball very well from the outside. They knock down jumpers from 16-23 feet very well (40.7%, Sixth in the NBA) with the highest assist rate for these shots (77.2%, seven percent more than second place) to go with the seventh highest effective field goal percentage from three (54.6%).

(Thank you HoopData for the stats)

All of this is obviously because of Deron Williams. They can get into the heart of the defense whenever they need to. A lot of this has to do with dribble penetration that leads to players cutting towards the basket for easy scores. Deron Williams draws in the interior defense like a magnet. If the defense is able to create a wall and account for the cutters, they often will leave the perimeter shooters locked, loaded and without the safety on.

And this is the double-edged sword of how you defend the Jazz, especially when Deron Williams is on the court. You have to give in somewhere. If you’re allowing points inside, you’re probably also allowing free throw attempts and three-point plays due to late rotations and dumb fouls inside. But if you pack in the paint, you’re leaving deadly and timely outside shooters in the area that counts for the most points. So what do you do?

You have to form a pocket on defense. They’re least efficient from the middle of the floor. Put them in the 10 to 15-foot range and you’ve got your best chance of stopping them. There are no Rip Hamiltons on this team and Jeff Hornacek certainly isn’t walking through that door. You need to pack in the middle then swarm the perimeter in a furious effort of defensive rotations. The trick is keeping those interior guys in place and flanking the passing options. Make them run enough clock and the Jazz perimeter guys will have to pull up off the dribble for “bad” mid-range jumpers. It’s actually one of the simplest ways to try to bait a team into taking bad shots but it does take smart and disciplined defense.

With Denver, it’s sort of the same thing. They finish well inside and they shoot well from three. You want to force them into the mid-range area and pray that Carmelo Anthony isn’t the one taking those shots. They need to have a very simple game plan on offense. Pick-and-roll the Jazz to death with Chauncey Billups and make the Utah big men play on the perimeter. If they struggle to show on the screen, Chauncey can pull the jumper or drive into the paint. If the defense collapses, he can have Arron Afflalo and JR Smith in the corners, ready to knock in three-pointers from their hot spots.

The Nuggets will also need to get out in transition and try to knock down threes in these situations. The key will be finding JR Smith on the break and get him the ball in a position to rise and fire. JR Smith shot just 34% from three this season, which seems like a very manageable rate even when you factor in the quantity in which he shot them. But in transition, his percentage increased to 44% from three. Also, Carmelo Anthony is extremely efficient scoring on the break. His field goal percentage of 46% jumps up to 62% in transition. You can run with this team, especially when Ty Lawson is coming in for a change of pace, at a very efficient clip.

It sounds so simple for both teams. Get the ball into the areas you score with the highest efficiency. Push the tempo if you’re the Nuggets. Live off of dribble penetration and the chaos it creates if you’re the Jazz.

Don’t Forget To Pray For Health

This is where the series will ultimately be won – in the training room.

The Nuggets need Kenyon Martin to be healthy. When he’s healthy, he changes the game for opposing big men. Most players can’t handle the bulk and the versatility of the Boozer-Millsap combo inside. He’s always been able to neutralize what Carlos Boozer does offensively. He defends and challenges shots well while not letting Boozer live at the free throw line. While Millsap has been able to score at a highly efficient percentage of 63% in his career against K-Mart, Martin has still been able to match him point for point and rebound for rebound.

Kenyon Martin is a neutralizer inside defensively and that’s exactly what the Nuggets need to contain the power forward combination the Jazz throw at opponents.

In a similar way, this is what the Jazz need from Andrei Kirilenko. He’s the perfect defender for Carmelo Anthony. He’s long enough to bother jumpers. He’s agile enough to absorb the contact and still be able to recover when Carmelo makes his moves inside. He makes Melo work for his points and doesn’t really allow him to go crazy. Carmelo still gets his numbers but it’s rare that he goes NOVA against the Russian. In 19 career matchups, Carmelo Anthony has only scored 30 or more points five times against Kirilenko.

If Andrei Kirilenko can play then the Jazz have the man that can contain Anthony and that wins a huge battle for them. You’re then allowed to put Deron Williams up against Chauncey Billups one-on-one and when that happens I like Deron’s chances of being the better player. Then all you have to ask for is Wesley Matthews to be a pest for JR Smith and try to prevent him from getting in a rhythm from deep.

But again, this is all IF Kenyon and Kirilenko can be healthy.

Series Prediction
This may be the most fun series we see throughout the entire first round. Both teams like to push it like Salt ‘N’ Pepa. Both teams like to ramp up the offense. And both teams can play good enough defense to make the other team earn their points. There is no real throwaway aspect in this series. It’s just going to be seven very competitive games between two teams that are always hard to fully buy into. And the prize at the other end of the first round is a second round showdown with the Los Angeles Lakers.

Normally in these evenly matched 4-5 series I take the home team. I assume the house will be protected regardless and that the series will be seven straight wins by the home team. And when the team with home court advantage has the best player in the series (Carmelo Anthony) that seems to be even more of a no-brainer. However, I don’t trust the health situation of Kenyon Martin and I certainly don’t trust the depth of the big man rotation Denver employs. After Nene (who should dominate Mehemt Okur in every way) the Nuggets are relying on Chris Andersen and Johan Petro. Those are components of a great movie about a cross-country trip but they don’t exactly make me think, “Those are two guys who can contain the Boozer-Millsap hybrid.”

Then we get to the ultimate X-factor for me in this series – Deron Williams. We’ve seen some special things from Deron Williams over the past two years as he makes his case for best point guard in the NBA. This is his chance to truly prove he’s a cut above the rest. By getting the better of Chauncey Billups in a series in which he’s scheduled to play more road games than home he can truly shine and show the nearly perfect weapon he is. I tend to gravitate towards the best point guard of the series when two teams are this even.

With that I’ve got to take the Jazz to go the distance in this series. They’re least likely to knock off the Lakers in round two but that’s not their concern right now. Their concern is keeping their offensive attack simple and to execute it properly.

Regardless of how the series plays out, the trailer is pretty kick-ass.

Jazz Win in Seven

NBA Playoffs Preview: 8) Oklahoma City Thunder Vs. 1) Los Angeles Lakers (Think David Vs. Goliath Only They Both Have Slingshots)

April 15, 2010 in by with 6 Comments

A little over a week ago, the Thunder and their fans were up in arms over poor officiating in their overtime loss to the Utah Jazz. There was good reason for the uproar. CJ Miles got away with slapping ten with Kevin Durant when the league’s leading scorer put up a game-winning attempt. The attempt fell short, the whistle of referee Tony Brothers remained silent and state of Oklahoma went nuts.

I warned that if they thought the officiating here was bad and a disaster, they should wait until they’re forced to deal with the officiating in a playoff series against the Lakers. At the time, the Thunder looked to be no worse than the sixth seed in the West. As fate would have it, they dropped to the eighth seed, setting up a showdown with the Lakers in the first round. And it certainly will be a showdown.

The war of the words has already started too. Phil Jackson came out and said that he thinks Kevin Durant is getting preferential treatment from the refs. This caused Kevin Durant to say Phil was being disrespectful. The dance begins!

This is actually perfect for Thunder fans to go through. It’s not that I want them to suffer in any way. But drawing the Lakers in the first round of their first playoff series as a new franchise (they’re basically brand new) is the equivalent of new fan base hazing. There is a certain naivety with the Thunder fan because they’ve been fortunate enough to see almost immediate success. Look at the Bobcats or the Grizzlies or the T’Wolves. Those teams didn’t get their stuff together in three years. Sure the Thunder had a head start with the remnants of the Sonics but to be a 50-win team so early is pretty damn incredible. And now they’re truly being thrown into Playoff Basketball 101.

This is what Phil Jackson does and essentially, this is what the playoffs are all about. It becomes a minefield of mind games. You have to watch your step. You’re strolling along and then all of a sudden… BOOM! Phil Jackson is working the refs through the media. You put yourself back together again, take another step and then… BOOM! Kobe Bryant is insulted at the idea of Thabo Sefolosha guarding him one-on-one.

The Kobe thing was made up but trust me, it will happen. And when it does, it’s going to piss you off. This is how the playoffs will go too. This is what happens.

BOOM! Serge Ibaka can’t seem to stay out of foul trouble.

BOOM! Jeff Green is getting push under the boards and not getting the call.

BOOM! Ron Artest just dyed Kevin Durant’s hair blonde mid-game.

BOOM! A Kardashian is stalking Eric Maynor.

These kinds of things happen when you’re facing the Lakers. This is the kind of thing that will toughen up a young, burgeoning franchise like the Thunder. It’s a good thing that they’re facing the Lakers in their first playoff series since moving to the middle of the country and it’s good that the fans will get a taste of just how frustrating the playoffs can be. Because when the Thunder eventually do win the whole damn thing and take each next step in order to do so, it’s going to feel 100 times more rewarding for the Thunder fans.

Like the title of this post says, we’re getting a showdown between David and Goliath only it looks like they both have a slingshot. David’s slingshot is accurate and deadly. He knows that someday his slingshot will take down every enemy in the land. However, Goliath isn’t alone with his slingshot.

Goliath is flanked by a slew of Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Men. And they can flat-out hit the boards.

Unfortunately for Kevin Durant, he’s the only Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man on his squad. Jeff Green is fantastic at what he does when he does it. Nenad Krstic, Nick Collison and Serge Ibaka are all nice role-playing big men to have. Etan Thomas has funny hair, long arms that can challenge shots and a slew of poems to make Pau Gasol look deep inside his heart and figure out if the man in the mirror is truly happy with his beard or in need of a shave.

But they don’t have the length, size and skill of the Lakers frontcourt. If Andrew Bynum is healthy enough to play, the Lakers are going to own the boards. I mean OWN them. With the Lakers controlling every defensive rebound and getting the ball into the hands of Lamar Odom, Kobe Bryant or whatever Shannon Brown/Derek Fisher/Jordan Farmar hybrid is fronting as the point man. When that happens, the Lakers will get out and run. As good as the Thunder have been defensively this season, they are not that good with transition defense. It makes no sense to me but that’s the truth. The Lakers will know this and the Lakers will exploit this.

So What’s Something The Thunder Can Count On?
A weakness of the Lakers is a strength for the Thunder – the bench. The Lakers don’t have much to offer other than Lamar Odom off the bench. And when Andrew Bynum isn’t in uniform that means they have nothing to offer off the bench. Shannon Brown isn’t a very good NBA player. He’s a defensive athlete that isn’t that good at defense most of the time. Nobody quite knows what Jordan Farmar does out on the court. Sasha Vujacic has been in need of some maintenance for years now. Josh Powell and DJ Mbenga can be serviceable big men but at the same time they’re still Josh Powell and DJ Mbenga. Luke Walton used to play basketball but now he just draws pictures on a notepad.

This is where the Thunder can take advantage. Their best lineup this season in terms of +/- was Eric Maynor at point, James Harden at the two, Kevin Durant at the three and Serge Ibaka manning the paint with Nick Collison. When the Lakers go to their bench, the Thunder can counter with this lineup and wreak some havoc in the backcourt. Ibaka and Collison will be good enough defensively to handle the Lakers big men off the bench and possibly control the boards. They’ll also still have Durant doing Kevin Durant things on the wing.

This is how the Thunder can keep games close. When Kobe and/or Pau are out of the game, they have to either close the gap or extend the lead based on what the score is. If the bench can’t take advantage of their prowess over the Lakers bench then they are going to be struggling throughout this series.

What Will The Lakers Use To Tip The Scales?
Sometimes it’s as simple as experience when it comes to these kinds of series. A lot of people like to say that experience is overrated but it SO isn’t. The Lakers are already exemplifying how experience works by Phil Jackson setting a trap that Kevin Durant walked right into. But the biggest way the Lakers will flex their massive experience muscles will be at the end of games.

These games should be pretty close. The Lakers are 9-1 in their last 10 matchups against the Thunder and four of those games ended up being really close. The Lakers won all of them. The only game the Thunder won was a blowout late in the year on a night in which everything went right for the Thunder and everything went so very opposite for the Lakers. But when these games are close, you’re going to have to look at who has the better end of game option.

I don’t necessarily buy into the criticism that Kevin Durant isn’t clutch. Just because you miss the occasional jumper at the end of a game doesn’t mean you’re not clutch. Let’s say he never gets fouled on that play in Utah and he just flat out misses the shot. Does that lack of “clutchness” overshadow the fact that he went straight Iron Man on the Jazz when OKC was down 11 with three minutes to go? Not at all.

But look at the clutch stats according to 82games.com from this season. Kevin Durant shoots 39% from the field in the fourth quarter or overtime with less than five minutes left and neither team leading by more than five points. Kobe Bryant shoots 43.2% during these situations. Is that a huge differential? Not really. But the more telling stat to me is the way both players take care of the ball. Kobe averages 3.9 assists and 3.1 turnovers per 48 clutch minutes. He also gets assisted on just 19% of his made field goals during this time. Compare that to Durant’s 1.7 assists and 5.4 turnovers per 48 clutch minutes and the fact that Durant is assisted on more than half of his made field goals during clutch moments and that’s where I have to side with the Lakers experience, especially in crunch time over the Thunder.

Granted, I understand that the way the Lakers handle crunch time and the way the Thunder handle crunch time are completely different. But the Lakers still have a more full-proof plan at the end of games. They get the ball to Kobe and get the hell out of the way. The Thunder end up having Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant involved in a lot of plays in trying to find those clutch shots. Those are two guys that are prone to turnovers. So not only are you getting a lower percentage of shots falling with the Thunder’s best option but you also have a much lower chance of them getting the shot off due to being sloppy with the ball.

Kevin Durant is going to be a cold-blooded hitman at the end of games some day. He’s already molding his way into one. But it’s not there yet and it’s certainly not enough to beat Kobe Bryant with the refs and aura of experience emanating from him, his teammates and his head coach.

Series Prediction
Overall, I think it will be a highly competitive series. The Thunder are good defensively and they have the best scorer in all of basketball this season. They have a point guard that will feast on the inadequacy of the Lakers point guards. Russell Westbrook should be imitating what we saw from Rajon Rondo in the series against the Bulls last April. He’ll rack up triple-doubles in nearly every game. The Thunder should be able to put themselves on the map with the national audience and do so in a very positive way.

However, the Lakers will be smart about the way they approach this series. They’ll have Ron Artest hounding Kevin Durant, making life difficult in every movement on the court. Do I think Ron Artest can shut down Durant? Not at all. But he’ll make him work for everything he gets. He’ll have Pau Gasol and Lamar Odom showing hard on every screen-and-roll involving Durant. He’ll have defensive length covering nearly every inch of the halfcourt and making Durant second guess each decision. Eventually, Durant will calm down and put on an offensive display of fantastic proportions. I just don’t think it will be enough to take down the force of the Lakers in the playoffs.

I begrudgingly welcome the Thunder fans to life in the playoffs. You’re going to hate going against the Lakers. You’ll learn what many of us have experienced over a decade of dominance and calls going against your team without rhyme or reason. But you’ll be better off for it in the long run… especially with this team of yours.

Lakers Win in Six

NBA Rules: The System Gets Nellie Ball’d

April 15, 2010 in by with 13 Comments

“I was watching Court TV and I found a loophole in your case. I’m gonna talk to the judge about a writ of Habeas Corpus. I’ll put the SYSTEM on trial.” – Jim Carrey, Cable Guy.

Something really weird happened during the final game of the Warriors and Blazers regular season on Wednesday night. A basketball game was happening while a competition committee hearing broke out.

The situation was fairly simple: Don Nelson was being forced to play injured members of his team. When Devean George fouled out with just under four minutes to go in the game, Don Nelson wanted to keep him in the game and accept the applicable technical foul that came with doing such a thing. He’d already done it earlier in the season when Stephen Curry fouled out of a game and was allowed to keep playing. But during that game, the Warriors didn’t have eligible players in uniform sitting on the bench.

Before we go any further, watch the video I cut together from the game.

Here are some of my thoughts, reactions and things of note from this video:

- Nellie tried to let referee Phil Robinson know initially that Chris Hunter wasn’t going to come into the game. He wanted to keep Devean George in and take the technical foul. However, Eddie F. Rush takes control of the situation and explains to the Warriors coaching staff that the three eligible players (Anthony Morrow, Chris Hunter and Ronny Turiaf) were going to have to play before that could happen. In his mind and in the minds of the NBA rules, these guys should be playing in the game. Although I wanted to disagree with the referees (and did), they were ultimately correct. The Warriors tried to skate by the last game of the season without signing anymore players despite the fact that they were chock-full of injuries.

- It was brutal seeing Chris Hunter dragging his leg up and down the court. I know the Warriors were caught up in the moment a bit and didn’t really know how to approach it but I would have kept him on defense and never had him try to cross halfcourt. Especially when Chris Hunter gets knocked down on the blocking foul and is trying to get up, you know that had to have Nellie seething at this situation.

- At the 2:11 mark, I love that Nellie screams, “you’re supposed to know the rules.” It does actually seem like the refs were following the rules even though for the safety of the players involved there could be an exception made.

- Once Hunter is taken out of the game for good and Devean George is once again denied entry like a group of guys at a Vegas night club, I love the strategy that Nellie implements. Put Turiaf in, let him commit a foul right away and pull him from the game. Then when there’s a stoppage of play after Morrow goes in, pull him from the game too so that Devean George HAS to be allowed to come back in.

- For those of us that have chastised Nellie this season and the past couple seasons for not caring about his job, it’s nice to see how disturbed he was by this whole incident. He genuinely hated having to put Chris Hunter, Ronny Turiaf and Anthony Morrow into this game. He was worried for their health and safety as if he was a concerned parent.

- How about that blocked shot by Hunter?!?

- Everyone that was watching this game and not a Blazers fan was rooting for a Devean George game-winner. It would have sparked a crap hurricane throughout the media world.

- I think we’ll see this rule revisited with the competition committee in some way. Maybe it won’t be changed because after all, Nellie and the Warriors were fudging the injury report a bit. However, there has to be a way for a coach to be able to avoid bringing in his injured players.

- Stephen Curry goes OFF. 26 points in the second half for him and he scored 11 of the Warriors final 14 points to win this game. He capped off a fantastic rookie season with a 42-point effort. He’s in the same zone that I felt Allan Houston was in when he played. I can’t remember a single jumper that either player has ever missed in their careers. As far as I’m concerned, Curry and Houston have never missed a jump shot before.

- I don’t know how you could possibly not love Nellie after watching that video.

NBA Playoffs: Thunder Just Experienced What Playoff Basketball Frustration Is All About

April 7, 2010 in by with 9 Comments

After the Jazz “beat” the Thunder with a 140-139 overtime victory on Tuesday night, I looked at the reaction from the Thunder fans in the Daily Dime Live chat, I looked at the fallout on Twitter and I had some playful banter back and forth with various people in the blogging and blog-reading world. But still, I debated on whether or not to write this piece.

Despite what the proprietor of this website would lead you to believe, I really like this Thunder team. I’ve been big on Russell Westbrook since he was at UCLA. I’ve enjoyed watching him prove to the doubters that he’s a legit NBA point guard and one that will star in the association. I love the deadly repertoire that Kevin Durant destroys his opponents with. I’ve definitely seen more complete scorers throughout the history of this game than Kevin Durant but it isn’t a big number and it certainly isn’t a list of players that are more fun to watch than KD. I marvel at the amount of weapons he has at his disposal. He’s the NBA equivalent of Iron Man out there. And they have so many fun role players on this team (including my favorite college fan crush in Eric Maynor) that it is literally impossible for me to not enjoy this team play on a nightly basis.

Then you’ve got the community of Thunderites (a horrible nickname I came up with tonight). Royce Young is one of my favorite people to read because he has such passion for this young franchise and he’s just damn good at what he does. He has good people writing for him at Daily Thunder and whenever I peruse the comment sections of the site, I’m amazed at the thoughtful and intelligent nature of the ideas the readers type out to help add to the discussion.

I knew that if I wrote this piece, I’d end up most likely offending a fan base that I really do enjoy and that’s not my intention. I’m probably going to come off as smarmy, snarky or some other “S” word that ends in a “Y” that nobody wants to be labeled. Hopefully, they’ll see the merit in this post instead of reading it as hatred because that does not exist in my words here.

So here goes:

You’re blowing this no-call against Kevin Durant and the Thunder WAY out of proportion.

I’m reading things all over the internet about how Kevin Durant not getting a foul call at the end of a regular season game in which the Thunder will still get to go to the playoffs regardless of the outcome is a tragedy. Apparently, it’s a travesty and a sham and a mockery.

I’m sorry but you’ve got to get over this and put things in perspective.

CJ Miles did block Kevin Durant’s shot at the end of the game. You can clearly see that he gets a little ball. The problem with the block though is that he hit a crap-load of hand on the follow-through. It’s not even close. It should be a no-brainer call. Put Kevin Durant at the line for three shots. Considering he’s having a historic free throw shooting season, I’m guessing he makes two of the three at worst and the Thunder have to wait out a desperation heave with 0.6 seconds left. If the heave falls by the wayside, the Thunder are sitting pretty with 49 wins, five games to play and their sites on a possible division title.

Unfortunately, the whistle didn’t get blown. Welcome to the NBA.

This happens a lot. There is a definite problem with the officiating in the NBA. This isn’t any big newsbreak. There are missed calls all the time. There are missed calls that influence the final moments of a game. But they don’t decide the outcomes of the games. There were 45 missed OKC shots, 17 missed threes, five missed free throws, 18 turnovers, 28 points off of those turnovers, and 16 offensive rebounds given up in this game by the Thunder. One missed call did not lose the game at all.

Does it suck that you essentially got screwed on the final play of the game? Absolutely. Is it going to be the last time this happens to your franchise? Wait until you play the Lakers in the playoffs someday. This swift kick to the gonads is going to feel like a Swedish massage.

The Thunder fan base is extremely new to the NBA. You haven’t gone through this stuff before; I realize that. But you’re going to have to get used to it and get used to it quickly. You have a young, talented team that is going to be in the playoffs for the next 10 years, minimum. This is going to be a regular occurrence since you’re in a small market, according to most NBA fans. You’ve experienced the frustration of the Salt Lake Bias that sweeps through the NBA year after year. Just wait until you feel the East Coast Big Market Bias or the Lakers Need To Be In The Finals For Ratings Bias.

This is not a travesty. This is not tragic. This was losing a regular season game. You may think this took you out of division title contention or it might cause you to fall into the dreaded eighth seed by season’s end. It had no more affect on the standings than the Thunder dropping an early season road game in Sacramento. What about the other three overtime games the Thunder lost this season? They mean the exact same in the wins and losses columns that this “crushing defeat” does.

A tragedy is watching Danny Manning’s knees fail him time after time when he should have been one of the best players of the past 25 years.

A tragedy is watching a player get called for a foul because Kobe Bryant elbowed him in the nose during a crucial inbound moment of Game 6 of the Western Conference Finals.

A tragedy is watching Greg Oden’s knee explode when he was starting to show that he could have a huge positive impact on the game and the future of the Western Conference.

A tragedy is watching Dwyane Wade get to the line in the 2006 NBA Finals because the Mavericks shot him a questionable glance as the fate of the 2006 NBA Finals was seemingly being scripted right in front of everyone’s eyes.

A tragedy is seeing Shaun Livingston’s knee ligaments play a game of Twister on the court.

Those are basketball tragedies. What you experienced Tuesday night was a great game have a deflating ending because Tony Brothers decided to swallow the whistle. You just experienced the equivalent of basketball indigestion.

Should you be mad? Sure. Should you be outraged? That’s taking it a bit far. This is not that big of a deal. You need to put it in a little bit of perspective and respect the history of bad NBA calls before you. This was no different than the phantom call on Paul Millsap in favor of your team a couple months earlier.

Do two wrongs make a right? Often never. But this is the officiating world we all have to live in until the machines take over the Earth and we get perfect robot referees.

Don’t let losses like this consume you. Take it for what it is, mull it over for a few minutes and move on. You don’t want to become that bitter fan base. That’s not fun for anybody.

And remember, you still have Kevin Durant and I owe Matt Moore a cake because of it.

Yao-zers – Andrew Bogut Out For The Season

April 4, 2010 in by with 6 Comments

This just sucks. We’ve been robbed of our manifest playoff destiny once again.

Andrew Bogut is out for the year. Now, normally this wouldn’t be huge news and it wouldn’t really matter with just a week and a half remaining in the regular season. Normally, the Bucks would have been eliminated from playoff contention for a couple of weeks now and the city of Milwaukee would be turning their attention to Prince Fielder and the rest of the Milwaukee Brewers. But not this year.

This year, the Bucks aren’t just making the playoffs; they’re putting teams on notice that if you face them in the first round you’re going to be in for a rude awakening. The Bucks are scrappy but it’s a different kind of scrappy. In the past, we’ve had scrappy teams that “nobody wanted to face.” They were teams who most likely put up a lot of points or had huge glaring weaknesses that far superior teams would be able to exploit in a seven-game series. The Wolves teams from the late 90s and early 00s were scrappy but you didn’t truly fear them. Tracy McGrady’s Orlando teams were scrappy but you knew they weren’t pulling off the massive upset against better teams. But this Bucks teams is completely different.

Or at least it was until last night when Andrew Bogut seemingly slipped off the rim and fell on his right arm. The diagnosis is a dislocated elbow, a broken hand and a sprained wrist. If it was just one of those injuries, the tough Australian anchor to the Bucks defense would wrap it up and go be the destructive defensive force he’s been all season. He’d be the guy that makes you wonder if Dwight Howard is hands down the best defensive player of the year.

Dislocated elbow? He’d probably pop it back into place in a pseudo-tribute to Lieutenant Riggs and go out there and be the guy Milwaukee needs him to be. If it was a broken hand, he’d most likely tape it up, take a few painkillers and go out there to carry out the plan of his defensive-minded coach. Sprained wrist? I don’t even know that we would hear about him having a sprained wrist. Andrew Bogut is one of the toughest guys in the NBA. He has that Aussie blood running through his veins that allows him to feel very little pain. However, throw all of those injuries together into one horrible fall and you’re left with the situation the Bucks are in.

It’s eerily reminiscent to the Houston Rockets situation from last season. With Tracy McGrady on the shelf already, the Rockets lost Yao Ming deep into their playoff push against the Lakers. The Rockets were already in the playoffs and in the middle of a Round 2 showdown with the eventual champs. After Game 3, we found out Yao Ming had a hairline fracture in the same left foot that had sustained three significant injuries throughout his career. It was completely deflating for all basketball fans that didn’t root for the forum blue and gold. When you have a scrappy team with the odds stacked against them, you don’t want them to lose their best player in the middle of what could be a special run.

Would the Rockets have beaten the Lakers in the second round of last year’s playoffs? Would the Bucks have advanced to the second round or the Eastern Conference Finals on the shoulders of the biggest, toughest man in Milwaukee? Unfortunately, we will never get those answers. We’re left to guess and hypothesize instead of get a definitive yes or no to the situation.

Much like the Rockets, the Bucks were already without their best wing scorer – a fate they have grown accustomed to and are used to dealing with. They know life without Michael Redd just the same as Houston knew life without Tracy McGrady. It was something you could sort of prepare for and make due with. Any NBA wing player (outside of Sasha Pavlovic or Sasha Vujacic or anybody named Sasha) can get hot and carry his team for an extended period of time. But like that Rockets team, this Bucks team has always been praying the bad luck wouldn’t once again trickle down into the post and befall their franchise big man.

What’s left of the Bucks is an aircraft carrier with no anchor. The Bucks are left with Ersan Illyasova playing the role of a much younger Luis Scola, Luc Richard Mbah a Moute playing the role of Shane Battier, John Salmons as a heavily medicated Ron Artest and Brandon Jennings as the flashier and more swaggerish version of Aaron Brooks. And I sort of hope it works.

What we need now is this Bucks team to rally around this adversity. We need them to accept this horribly dealt hand and bluff their way into winning a pot.

I often get labeled as a Brandon Jennings “hater” because I believe Tyreke Evans is not only the better player but is far more deserving of the Rookie of the Year award. The truth is I’m crazy about Brandon Jennings. Just because I believe Tyreke is better and more likely to receive the hardware doesn’t mean I’m not a Jennings fan. I’ve always been a fan of point guards first in this league. I’m drawn to them for some reason. Honestly, I would love nothing more than Brandon Jennings to go NOVA for the entire playoffs and give the opposing defenses more than they could ever hope to handle.

I want Brandon Jennings to turn back into the Pterodactyl With Wings of Fire. I want him to find the jumper that eluded him for too long this season. I want the three-point shot to snap through the bottom of the net. I want the runner to fall, the pull-up jumper to splash and the dribble to be so succinct and elusive that defenders are left confused and trying to recreate the scene of the crime to figure out how their dignity was taken from them on Jennings’ way to the court. I want chalk outlines of defenders’ ankles on the court and William Petersen brilliantly piecing the whole thing together with his creepy beard.

The Bucks may be deflated with the loss of Andrew Bogut for the rest of this campaign but this is a new Milwaukee team. Hopefully they can show the innate toughness that their coach and defensive centerpiece have infused into Bucks basketball.

Fear the Deer.

NBA Playoffs: You Can’t Always Get What You Want… At Least Right Now

April 1, 2010 in by with 10 Comments

By now, you’ve probably watched the Kevin Garnett swearing video about 100 times and giggled about it with your friends.

What’s that? There are a lot of KG swearing videos? You need me to clarify?

I mean the latest one. The Kevin (oooo-weeeee that’s a bad word) Durant video. Hell, here it is one more time (via Daily Thunder). Remember, there’s a bad word in this video so you don’t want to play it in a place that gives you a paycheck for reading this site when your boss isn’t looking.

I know, I know. It’s hilarious isn’t it? Kevin Garnett, who used to be beloved and respected before he went to a big market and kicked the tar out of your favorite team, is pissed at the refs. He’s complaining. I get the irony that a big market team is complaining about the refs. The beauty of it is that the refs weren’t even that bad. Did Durant get some questionable calls? Possibly. I’m sure most of them were legit just like all of the other calls in the NBA.

What you see here is a frustrated, fading Boston Celtics team figuring out their actual place in the NBA. They’re not title contenders. They know they’re not title contenders. I mean, they don’t really know it but I think deep down they suspect it’s just not going to happen. They’ve been there before and accomplished it against a really good Lakers team. They know how good you have to be to win a title. And it isn’t there this year.

Garnett isn’t healthy enough and even if he’s around 90%, he’s become too old or too rusty or just plain not good enough. He hasn’t had to carry a team in three years. He used to be able to put up insane numbers like it was just something you did. Even if he had been completely healthy over the past two seasons, I don’t know that he’d be able to still carry a team like that now. He’s been out of practice with it for so long that the ability just isn’t strong enough to carry out a feat like that.

Throw in the fact that Paul Pierce moves like Bill Murray taking baby steps to the elevator, Ray Allen is busy listening to random music with green fog surrounding him and the Celtics bench is about as deep as any of the people on The Real World: Washington DC and you’re left with a big problem. Rasheed Wallace is a punch line, people are still trying to figure out exactly what Marquis Daniels does for a living and Michael Finley basically needs a Hoveround to get from the locker room to the court.

This team used to be mean. This team used to be deep enough to throw an impregnable defense at you with timely offense sprinkled around it. This team used to break you down physically and mentally until the point of frustration and then squeak out victories on their way to hoisting up a trophy. Now, they’re the frustrated ones. They’re complaining about a 21-year old getting calls on their home floor instead of just shutting him down. Hell, they could play him 100 times and not shut him down once. It has more to do with their inability and lack of pieces to accomplish this rather than Durant’s ability to trick the newest fan base in the NBA into foolishly throwing the Jordan name around as some sort of synonym.

But as bad as this team supposedly is, it’s sort of absurd that people think they’ll lose in the first round of the playoffs. Look, I know that you all HATE Boston because the media blah blah blah and Kevin Garnett blah blah blah and Curt Schilling yatti yatti yatta. That’s fine. I understand people taking great enjoyment in the demise of the Boston Celtics. I mean I don’t because to me, I’d like a team to be at full strength and near their peak if my team is going to beat them. It means more and gives the opposing fans nothing for excuses. However, I sort of see why you’d like to feast on an irrevocably vulnerable Celtics team.

The problem is people are foolish enough to actually believe the Celtics aren’t going to make it past the first round. It’s fine if you want to believe in fairy tales and believe that Cinderella is ALWAYS going to wear the glass slipper at the end of March Madness. It’s fine if you want to believe the Easter Bunny will be here in a few days. But don’t trick yourself into thinking this Celtics team can’t win a seven-game series against a team that isn’t Top 12 in the NBA or possessing home court advantage in the first round.

Would we all love for Dwyane Wade to start his campaign to entice another big name free agent to South Beach this summer with an upset victory that vaults his team into the second round of the playoffs? Sure. We’d also love to see a young team of role players and virtual nobodies go out and embody the spirit of their coach as they win with defense and playing within themselves. We’d also love to see Larry Brown not only take the Bobcats to their first playoff series in franchise history but turn the world on its head as they march into the second round. And we’d all love for Toronto to do whatever the hell it has to do to salvage a working relationship with Chris Bosh.

But none of that is going to happen. Maybe if we still had five-game opening series, I’d believe it to be possible. Unfortunately, we don’t.

The Celtics still have arguably the best defense in the league right now. Their defensive efficiency is first (102.4), they force teams into a lot of turnovers (17.4 turnover rate is second) and they don’t allow teams to make shots (7th best defensive eFG% at 48.3%). They win at home (seventh best home record) and on the road (second best home record). They turn their games into free throw shooting contests and with the big market bias that everybody loves to complain about, that strategy seems to favor them.

I know the Bobcats, Heat or Bucks could beat the Celtics in theory. But application is so much harder in the NBA. The Celtics can’t win series against the Cavaliers and Magic. It looks like the Hawks finally have their number too. But a lower seed without homecourt advantage just doesn’t seem likely to occur in this NBA climate. Can the Bobcats and Bucks score enough to actually knock off the Celtics? Can Jermaine O’Neal’s knee be duct-taped enough together to provide a defensive safety valve for seven grueling games? We don’t even need to ask the question about the Raptors defense because even the people most against Celtic green wouldn’t consider Toronto winning that series.

The Celtics are vulnerable but it’s a different tier of vulnerable than everybody wants. They’re vulnerable to the top dogs in the NBA. They’re not vulnerable enough to the playoff hopefuls. Aside from Toronto, I’d almost guarantee any first round series the Celtics have will end in seven games. And those seven games are going to be exhausting for this fading power.

For now, enjoy the decline of the brief Celtics Empire. Watch the KG video above time and time again. Laugh at how the Celtics’ forced pride is diluting their sense of reality. But don’t trick yourself into thinking they won’t move onto the second round of the playoffs this season.

They won’t exactly be facing Kevin (aggressive expletive) Durant.

Witnessing Confidence, Validation and Candor

March 26, 2010 in by with 16 Comments

Let me give you a brief story about when my opinion of Kobe Bryant changed.

I used to hate the guy. Couldn’t stand him. It had nothing really to do with him ripping the heart out of my team or butting heads with Shaq in any way. There was just something about him. The arrogance was too much for me. If he scored 40 points, I’d bash his shot selection and his lack of gumption for wanting to share the ball. He was a “ball hog” and a “detriment to his team.”

To be honest with you, this completely stemmed because he was too much like Michael Jordan. Whether you want to admit it or not, this guy is basically Jordan. He’s not as good and never has been or will be. But he’s a clone of Jordan in the same way that the Sleazy Steve from Multiplicity was a clone of regular Steve. It’s all of the worst qualities in basically the same package.

I was protective of Michael Jordan at the time. He was clearly the greatest and we weren’t going to be seeing much of him for the rest of our lives. We had to remember the moments he gave us and try to keep them in the proper perspective. We had to protect the legacy he gave us to guard. And when Kobe came into the league, moved on from the rookie airballs against the Jazz and started learning how to destroy everybody on the court, I (like many others) got defensive.

When he won titles, it was because of Shaq. When he scored a ton of points, it was because he was selfish. When he got assists, it was because he was trying to trick us into thinking he was a team player. Whatever the accomplishment was that he just met, I had an excuse for it. But then it all changed.

He scored 81 points against the Toronto Raptors. I still remember getting the text from my friend (and Lakers fan), Chris, telling me that he finished with 81. I figured it was a typo or Chris was trying to brag about his burgeoning NBA 2K skills. It was neither. Kobe Bryant scored 81 points in a regular season professional basketball game against a professional basketball team. At that point, I had nothing to say about him that didn’t gush with respect. It was like a switch had been flipped in my mind and every previous bit of hatred for the guy had never existed. I was sold on Kobe Bryant.

The bravado and arrogance that rubbed me in all of the wrong ways and none of the fun ways was merely an acute sense of confidence. Maybe that’s just a fancy way of saying he’s arrogant as all hell but I was able to justify it in my mind as plain old confidence. He didn’t want to pass in clutch situations because he didn’t trust his teammates. People viewed that as him being the anti-christ but it was completely legit. If you’re the best player in the world, why would you pass the ball if you have the best chance at making the shot? I got it finally and it was the 81-point game that solidified it for me. The confidence had been proven to be valid. And I guess all along, that’s what I needed from Kobe to accept what he did on the court.

It doesn’t mean that since that day I’ve agreed with everything he’s done. It’s probably far from it. But I didn’t loathe him anymore. I respected and feared him. I didn’t care about the person or the motives. I just wanted to see him play basketball and appreciate it.

And that’s what I want from my superstars now. I want the attitude that should come with the skills.

When I saw Vin Diesel on The Tonight Show (in what had to be one of his first appearances on the show), I was completely disappointed. I knew next to nothing about Vin. I knew he was playing bad-ass characters. I knew he played jerks and bullies. But what I didn’t know that he was the type of guy who would tell people to go for their dreams in real life. That wasn’t who I wanted him to be. I wanted him to tell me that he was better than me. I wanted him to walk past me on the street and think nothing of me if I needed help. I wanted him to show he was better than me if that was the image he portrayed in his everyday job. I didn’t get that. I got a wuss and I was disenchanted with him immediately.

That’s where I’ve been with LeBron James for much of his career. You could tell he was going to eventually be the best player in the league (not all-time).

He was a freight train like Sterling Sharpe.

But he was always cultivating his image. He had a plan to justify the insane amount of hype bestowed upon him as a teenager. He was going to become a billionaire athlete. He was going to become a global icon. He was going to be a one-man business model. And all of that is fine. It’s what we’ve heard him talk about before and what others have said about him. But the problem for me was it was the first thing on his mind.

It wasn’t basketball and it wasn’t winning. Now are those assumptions I made about him? Most likely, yes. But they were still vibes that he gave off that a lot of people received from him, whether they were true or not. That’s been my issue with him. He talks a lot in the media but I don’t think I’ve ever heard him actually say anything. He’s well groomed for dealing with the press. He speaks in clichés and smart marketing strategies. That’s not what I want in my superstars.

But what he said yesterday… THIS is what I want in my superstars.

This is what I wanted from LeBron all along. This is what I wanted from Vin Diesel on The Tonight Show. This is what I always got from Michael Jordan because he was so good at doing the marketing thing while reminding everybody that you couldn’t beat him.

I want that arrogance. I want that supreme confidence. I want LeBron to admit he can do whatever the hell he wants on a basketball court. Could he average a triple double? Look at his numbers; he’s pretty much doing it already in the month of March (28.4 points, 8.8 assists, 8.2 rebounds). Could he win the next 10 scoring titles if that was his wish? Yes, and there aren’t enough Kevin Durant jumpers to convince me otherwise.

I love that I saw that from LeBron. I love that he was candid in a REAL way and not in some packaged, laminated product he was trying to push onto me.

This is in a sense validation of what I see from him on a nightly basis. He IS that good and more importantly, he knows it and I’ve wanted to know that he knows it. Re-watch the final 10 seconds of that clip again. It gave me chills in the same way that his performance against the Pistons in Game 5 of the 2007 Eastern Conference Finals did. I love the certainty.

LeBron showed me what I’ve wanted from him all along. And I’m ready to change my opinion on what I think of him.

Human Dynamite Stick Goes Ka-Plooey

March 25, 2010 in by with 3 Comments

I was always fascinated with dynamite as a kid.

It wasn’t in the “I played with a magnifying death ray burning ants on the sidewalk, hope to find a friend with an illegal firework so I can play Russian roulette with my hand” sort of fascinated with dynamite way. It was totally legit. Whenever the coyote was chasing the roadrunner and had a trap set with some good ‘ole ACME TNT, I waited for the explosion and the colored stars to go pulsating through the screen without really caring about the end result.

What can I say? Explosions easily amused me as a child (and probably still am).

Well, when the Human Dynamite Stick, Josh Smith, threw down the TNT plunger with the walk-off tip dunk against the Orlando Magic Wednesday night, it had roughly the same affect on me. I didn’t necessarily care about the carnage it may have caused or left behind.

Take a look at it.

The shot goes up from Joe Johnson. Dwight Howard was left in No Man’s Land defensively as he can’t really get over to challenge the shot but also has to provide the threat of a hovering missile defense system in order to deter Joe from waltzing into the lane. This leaves the rebounding job up to Jameer Nelson and Rashard Lewis who are averaging 7.4 rebounds per game between them. Considering one of those guys is a Keith Closs blowout away from being seven feet tall that seems kind of like a paltry number.

This is the point in the cartoon in which you realize the dynamite isn’t working with the coyote. Even though it appears to be complying throughout the entire process, it’s going to end up exploding in the face of the coyote when it’s least expected.

Josh Smith had been hanging around the perimeter on this final play. He wanted the ball. He was just sitting out there, praying for a kick-out pass that would be entrusted to him to save the day. The pass never came. As internet sensation and two-time TrueHoop Network blogger, Sebastian Pruiti, pointed out, “he calls for the ball at the three-point line and doesn’t get it… last year he pouts and doesn’t go for the board.”

Josh Smith is out at the three-point line and normally would just sulk his way into overtime. It appears the dynamite is working with the coyote. But the dynamite doesn’t work the way you have always expected it to. Instead, the Human Dynamite Stick goes flying into the paint unabated. He rises up into the air (pulls the detonating plunger up into the air), catches the ball on his wrist and brings down the hammer (thrusts the plunger downward to ignite the explosion) as the buzzer sounds.

The result is pulsating stars filling your television screen. Ka-plooey.

Normally, I’d smile at the screen, wait for the credits to roll and move onto the next show. But this time I’m interested in the carnage and aftermath.

The Atlanta Hawks don’t matchup well with the Orlando Magic. In the past three seasons (including this current one), the Hawks are just 4-8 against the Magic. They can’t seem to handle Dwight Howard on the inside or the jump-shooting goodness on the outside. The styles don’t mesh.

But eventually, all that can change with one big catalyst. It’s funny how one buzzer-beating tip dunk can erase an entire mentality of being owned by another team. You forget that you don’t match up well with them. You forget that you struggled profusely on offense and could only manage 84 points in the first 47:59 of this game. It doesn’t matter. The dynamite exploded and the Orlando Magic have to wear it.

Now the Hawks are feeling good about themselves and the Magic are dealing with defeat. Might I add that they’re dealing poorly with the loss?

According to Brian Schmitz from the Orlando Sentinel, Rashard Lewis and Matt Barnes are not happy with coach Stan Van Gundy:

Lewis privately muttered something about Van Gundy’s offense on a night he was 2-of-9 for six points. Matt Barnes was seething at the coach, too.

Van Gundy took out defensive specialist Barnes for a long stretch in the fourth period, trying to get the Magic back in the game with shooters, and Barnes took it as a personal affront.

“He obviously doesn’t trust me down the stretch,” Barnes huffed.

I find it hilarious that the 6’10” forward with the $18 million price tag is blaming the coach for not getting him enough shots when a clearly missed box out of the second most dynamic athlete on the court is the reason the Hawks walked away with the home win. Throw a body on Josh Smith and keep him from getting to that board and you leave Flip Murray Mario West (I’ve had Flip on the brain lately) trying a desperation tip with Jameer Nelson all over him. Seems like a lot more of a low percentage shot than Josh Smith converting an unmolested tip dunk.

If Lewis boxes out Smith, the carom goes harmlessly off to the side and the players get ready for the overtime period. In this period, Matt Barnes gets a chance to make a difference and Rashard Lewis probably gets four or five more shot attempts to botch to satisfy his ego. The Magic go into their normal wing-clipping mode against the Hawks, pull out the tough road victory and head home with a season sweep of Atlanta.

Instead, Lewis got lazy, the rebound got crammed home and the Hawks now have a little swagger against Orlando that was previously nonexistent. Orlando now has to face internal issues that are being immaturely aired out in the media.

You can thank the uncooperative Human Dynamite Stick for that.

(Photo by Scott Cunningham/NBAE via Getty Images)

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