NBA Basketball 2007-08: The Thread Part II

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No spoken words said:
I try to imagine a world where LeBron has either:

A) A good coach. Not even a great one, just a good one.

B) A good teammate. Someone who is reliable every game. Not saying they are good for 20 points a night, but, wow, LeBron's supporting cast: not one of them, can be counted on to provide the same performance two games in a row. How can you be a legit playoff team when you have no legitimate 2nd scoring option?

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Cleveland should hire Paul Silas and trade for Drew Gooden...then they'd have a shot.
 
No spoken words said:
LeBron took a crap team to the finals at age 23. I mean, come on, that's no small feat at such a young age.

i'd make my obligatory "the east is awful" argument, but i'd probably get yelled at.

so here is my secondary argument, meant to prove the primary... if you could get a time machine and set up a game between this current cleveland lebroniacs team and the cleveland cavs team of ron harper, mark price, larry nance, brad daugherty and craig "jordan's bitch" ehlo, the mid/late 80's cavs team would win... probably going away. and they could barely get out of the 1st round at the time.


also... people kept making the same argument about allen iverson. "god, if they'd only put him with someone who could play." well, they finally did, and he still shoots 30 times a game. would lebron be different? especially if they got him with someone good while he was still young? i'd like to think so... but yea, just sayin'.

it's tough to get involved as teammates when your role involves standing around watching a guy dribble. but i suppose that's al roker's fault, not lebron's.
 
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To be fair, and I'm not a LeBron fan by any means, he was asked (repeatedly I think) about the Bird/'Nique game and the comparisons. I don't think he initiated that.

I think if you're LeBron you need to go a full season trusting your teammates. I can't expect the guy to do something different in game 7 of a playoff series, but I'd like to see the guy really commit to playing team ball and see what happens. It was so obvious yesterday when the first couple shots were no good (Szczerbiak and Ilgauskas maybe? Can't remember) that from that point on LeBron was taking the shots, period. And he did. But assuming everybody was there I'd like to see him commit to letting guys like Z and Smith and Delonte (not Wally, he sucks) have their shots and see how it works out. But they really do need to lose some of the dead weight on that team (Verajao is garbage).

OK did anyone at all think that of the 2 late season acquisitions the C's made the one who'd come up big in a game 7 would be PJ Brown rather than Sam Cassell? Other than that...Pierce. Damn.

Oh and a Jesus Shuttlesworth sighting in the conference finals would be a real boost.
 
my friend asked me yesterday via IM as to why PJ Brown was still in the league. my answer was simple... "because next to ben wallace, pj brown is bill russell."

he's a solid, consistant pro. he's like the jamie moyer of the nba... he may be old but hey, he still gets people out (sorta). i still hate him, though, for power bombing charlie ward all those many years ago :mad:
 
this made me laugh...

LeBron James said he thinks the improvements now must come in personnel. After losing to an extremely deep and recently massively upgraded Celtics team, James said he thinks the Cavs need to follow in their path, even after the 11-player trade that they pulled off in February. "I think what we have is very good, but we need to continue to get better. We know that,'' James said. "If that means some personnel changes that need to happen, then so be it. The teams around us in the league are continuing to get better.''


ummm... what? the celtics, who couldn't win because they gave away their entire depth, is now all of a sudden a deep team because the role players they have actually play well in doc rivers' system? i'm confused by this logic.
 
Well the Celts gave away their depth, but then filled the open roster spots with James Posey and Eddie House preseason, and added Sam Iam Cassell and PJ Brown during the stretch run...so the Celts do have a little depth. The bench isn't full of players like the 86 Celts but its not too bad, and miles ahead of Cleveland's. (frankly the Celts bench is better than the Cav's other starting 4 besides Lebron).


If (and its still a big if) the Celts win the title this year, the most responsible party will not be Pierce, nor Garnett and certainly not Ray "Caspar" Allen...it'll be Danny "tree bites man" Ainge.
 
Hewson said:
Well the Celts gave away their depth, but then filled the open roster spots with James Posey and Eddie House preseason, and added Sam Iam Cassell and PJ Brown during the stretch run...so the Celts do have a little depth. The bench isn't full of players like the 86 Celts but its not too bad, and miles ahead of Cleveland's. (frankly the Celts bench is better than the Cav's other starting 4 besides Lebron).


If (and its still a big if) the Celts win the title this year, the most responsible party will not be Pierce, nor Garnett and certainly not Ray "Caspar" Allen...it'll be Danny "tree bites man" Ainge.

eddie house and pj brown are not better than either delonte west or zydrunas illgauskus. illgauskus is very under utilized... he's a pure back to the basket player. when you run no sets, and the lane is always clogged, it's tough to, ya know, do stuff.

big Z is much much better than kendrick perkins, and delonte west vs. rajon rondo is debatable. obviously there's no comparison between kg & jesus and wally world & slightly above agerage sized ben... even though allen didn't do shit in this series, he's still an obvious upgrade over the word contributing player in the history of basketball, mr. ben wallace (i hope he didn't get too dizzy after the fireworks).

but to call boston "deep" is silly... they've become deep because they get a ton out of the same mediocre role players that many other teams have... i don't know if they just got the right role players, or if doc rivers or garnett's influence on them have gotten to fully accept the limited roles they have... but whatever it is the spare parts that boston has are vastly more productive than the spare parts cleveland has, and i tend to think that a guy like joe smith or pavlovic would be much more productive on boston than they are in cleveland.


i really don't want to get into a full lebron bash mode... but, eh, what the heck... there were two plays that were indicative of why boston won. both involved lebron in a negative fashion.

1) the jump ball... that was perhaps the most crucial moment of the game, and paul pierce was able to get to the ball before lebron out of sheer hustle, pride, and yes, desperation. perhaps it's because a lebron james team is never desperate that he didn't box pierce out and/or dive on the loose ball. perhaps if he had gone to college for a few years he'd learn that desperation isn't neccesarily a bad thing.

2) the (almost) last play... when the cavs were still alive and lebron shot the forced airball from 2 feet away. the celtics pushed the ball down the court, 4 cavs ran after them to try and foul and stop the clock. note the number... 4. watch the video... lebron never crossed half court, and he was the player in best position to foul immediately.

frankly to sum it up... yes, cleveland is obviously better with lebron than they'd be without lebron. but i don't think lebron makes his teammates better, which is one of the saddest things i could ever say because when he first came into the league he looked like he was going to turn the whole basketball world on it's head because of his unselfishness... making passing cool again. but, alas, he'd rather be jordan than magic.

so be it. he's not either.
 
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Headache in a Suitcase said:

so here is my secondary argument, meant to prove the primary... if you could get a time machine and set up a game between this current cleveland lebroniacs team and the cleveland cavs team of ron harper, mark price, larry nance, brad daugherty and craig "jordan's bitch" ehlo, the mid/late 80's cavs team would win... probably going away. and they could barely get out of the 1st round at the time.

Those late 80s-early 90s Cleveland teams were solid; they just had the misfortune of playing during the Jordan era.

This is a little bit off on a tangent, but casual basketball fans always forget that Craig Ehlo was a fine defender and an solid all-around player.

Cleveland down by two, Ehlo drains an open 3.

Cleveland up by 1, Ehlo gets impeded by a moving screen while chasing Jordan, chases him out to the arc, then Jordan inadvertently smacks him in the face on the way to a driving layup.

Cleveland down by 1, Ehlo inbounds the ball, takes the return pass on a sweet give-and-go and hits a layup past Jordan. Jordan had been assigned to cover Mark Price, but abandoned him and went over to swat Ehlo's shot when he saw the play develop.

Cleveland up by 1, Chicago inbounds the ball to Jordan. Jordan drives to the key with Ehlo a half-step behind, jumps, waits for Ehlo to succumb to gravity, then drains the series-winning shot. Ehlo collapses in agony and gets immortalized in a Gatorade commercial nearly 20 years later.
 
22, 32, 30, 29, 17. Those are the wins totals for the Cavs the 5 years prior to drafting LeBron.

35, 42, 50, 50, 45. Those are the wins totals for the Cavs the past 5 years. Toss in a trip to the NBA Finals.

They went from laughing-stock to Eastern Conference contender pretty rapidly, and it aint because Drew Gooden was on the team for a bit.

Again, I know that LeBron is not perfect and all, but Paul Pierce's Celtics have been a joke prior to KG and Ray and House and Posey arriving....but look at them now. And good for Pierce, by the way. I admire his guts and despite his sporadic fits of immaturity I root for the guy. He played Game 7 like it would be his last game ever, and I cannot say the same for LeBron.

But, few players can, on their own, elevate a team from the basement to being contenders and LeBron has done all that. And Headache, I have watched enough of the guy to know that he'd work the ball around even more than he does if anyone that team could ever have even two good games in a row. You just never know what you are going to get with his entire supporting cast with the exception of Z. Who never posts up. Cos of the amazing coaching.

Oh, and, LeBron did average over 7 assists per game. It's not like he never passes.
 
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Random note apropos of nothing:

Kobe Bryant has never shot over 47% from the field in a season.

This is what happens when you start spending too much time at work browsing basketball statistical sites.

I was also looking at Michael Jordan's last two seasons. The funny thing about the 2nd to last season is that if someone just told you his stats from that season, you'd think that whoever the player was had a fairly good year. Everything is relative, I guess. Also, stats don't tell you about hogging the ball, playing shit defense, making your teammates shit in their pants, etc. :)
 
i'm not denying lebron's talent i just think that he could make his teammates better, and i'm not sure if that's a product of piss poor coaching, incredible ego, or a little bit of both. i'd like to think it's the coaching, but everytime he opens his mouth i think it might be a little bit of both.

also he's not a good defender... his defensive stance screams of a player who's never been coached before. his ballance is incredibly top heavy. but that's besides the point.

anyhoo... who's ready for the draft lottery? :hyper:
 
Predictions for tonight?

I am wondering if Rob Horry will come out and smack David West to make sure the back never heals back... hmmm.

In any event, I hope the Spurs make it to the conference finals.
 
Headache in a Suitcase said:
i'm not denying lebron's talent i just think that he could make his teammates better, and i'm not sure if that's a product of piss poor coaching, incredible ego, or a little bit of both. i'd like to think it's the coaching, but everytime he opens his mouth i think it might be a little bit of both.

also he's not a good defender... his defensive stance screams of a player who's never been coached before. his ballance is incredibly top heavy. but that's besides the point.

anyhoo... who's ready for the draft lottery? :hyper:

Agreed on his defense, wholeheartedly, and, agreed on the anyhoo to move this along. :)

I enjoy the lottery. It's a drama and a sit-com all in one.

I'd not be surprised by any outcome tonight outside of one team blowing out the other...anything else is in play as I see it. I'll be pulling for the Hornets, though.
 
Boy, that was an ugly Game 7...

With a happy ending though.

I would say the Hornets lost it more than the Spurs won it.

Tough series against the Lakers, though. But who knows.

Go Spurs!
 
Not the prettiest game, but that happens sometimes when both teams have been bashing each others' brains out for the previous 6.
 
I actually like how the Spurs match up against the Lakers, putting Bowen on Kobe. And I hope Timmy eats Gasol for breakfast so the press cuts the Gasol hype for good.
 
Friggin' Hornets :( Now what do I do? I guess I'll root for the Spurs reluctantly. I just can't root for the Lakers, and if the Celts got past the Pistons I could see them having real problems guarding Kobe.

Impressive job by the Spurs though, I figured for them to win they'd need 40 from Duncan, he didn't come close to that and they still got it done.

I was thinking about the Duncan 3 yesterday...one shot, in the first round, and look how it effected the NBA. Totally changes history for the Suns and what they'll do in the offseason, sends D'Antoni to the Knicks, lots of things set in motion by one shot.
 
as long as he does it again this year.

in all honesty, though... the knicks do have a decent shot at a top 2 pick, but even though teams with worse odds have gotten the best pick before, if the knicks do end up with the #1, by completely legit means... everyone will think it was rigged anyways. so stern might as well just rig it and get it over with.
 
I'd like to go back to a topic that I meant to post on. It was the Peja vs. Manu argument.

I meant to chime in but let it slide...but I can't anymore. I would never take Peja over Manu. I know everyone gives Webber so much crap, but watch this video. HUGE...wide open three pointer for Peja and...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GMV5o0OUwLo

Long video, but just go to the 2:00 mark and you'll see.

I've just never seen him make a shot when it was a pressure situation. Last night, 3-11 7 pts.

I don't like Ginobili, but I trust him more than Peja.

Just wait, the bulls will get the 1st pick and draft Rose, then trade him for some defensive minded big man.
 
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I loved seeing Chris Paul take the flop vs. Ginobili in the last few minutes of the game, only for Ginobili to react like someone just kicked his dog.

Anyway, the Spurs are a great team, but I can't stand watching their brand of basketball. Do you think Stern wants a Pistons-Spurs rematch? Nah, didn't think so.
 
I think Headache may get a kick out of Gerry Callahan's column from today's Boston Herald...its a little fantasy look at where the Celts might be tonight had they won last year's draft lottery...

http://bostonherald.com/sports/colu...e_a_very_different_way/srvc=sports&position=1

Balls bounce a very different way
By Gerry Callahan
Tuesday, May 20, 2008 - Updated 18h ago
+ Recent Articles Boston Herald General Sports Columnist

For the second year in a row, the future of the Celtics will depend on the bounce of the ping-pong balls as the dregs of the NBA gather in Secaucus, N.J., tonight for the annual draft lottery. With a league-worst 9-73 record, the Celtics have the best chance of landing the top pick in the losers lottery tonight, just as they did a year ago.

Last May, it appeared as if the Celtics’ luck finally was changing. After two decades of missteps and malfeasance, the team’s prayers were answered. The balls bounced their way on lottery day and the Celtics got the No. 1 pick for the first time ever.

In New Jersey, Celtics emissary Tom Heinsohn lit up a victory Pall Mall while mayor Tom Menino ordered a rally outside City Hall headlined by his favorite singer, Dropkick Murphy.

The party continued into June when the team grabbed highly touted Ohio State center Greg Oden with the pick, and the club seemed to be turning the corner. Happy days had returned to Causeway Street at last.

But soon dark clouds again moved in over the storied Celtics franchise as an ESPN investigation revealed that Oden really was 67 and a decorated Korean War veteran. Oden admitted he lied about his age to get into sorority parties in Columbus and decided to come clean so he could get the senior discount at Dunkin’ Donuts.

Late last summer, as he was preparing for his first NBA training camp, Oden fell down while watching “Matlock” with his canasta group and suffered a hip injury. The Minnesota Timberwolves, who had offered to trade Kevin Garnett for Oden, withdrew their offer.

The Celtics had no choice but to set their sights on the lottery again and lose as many games as possible in the 2007-08 season. Former coach Doc Rivers announced that he couldn’t handle another season of tanking games so he resigned his position, allowing Celtics owner Wyc Grousbeck to hire the perfect man for the job.

“We needed one more season of complete ineptitude, and I think we can all agree that this is the best man to lead us there,” Grousbeck said as he introduced Isiah Thomas to the media.

Thomas was released from his contract with the Knicks after he was caught stealing office supplies.

“I came here because I think this is a young team with lots of potential,” Thomas said. “Plus, they have a couple of smoking-hot secretaries.”

Former Celtics director of basketball operations Danny Ainge followed Rivers out the door, allowing Thomas to assume the duties of general manager as well as coach. After trading Paul Pierce to New York for Stephon Marbury, Thomas set his sights on the available free agents. He called James Posey, who claimed he had given up basketball to focus on his true passion - alpaca farming. He also made an offer to Eddie House, who immediately hung up and changed his phone number.

During the season, veteran P.J. Brown laughed when asked if they would like to play in Boston.

“I’m waiting to see if Siberia makes me an offer first,” Brown said, giggling uncontrollably.

Sam Cassell told Thomas he would like to play for the Celtics but was busy re-arranging his sock drawer.

Boston again became the last place any decent NBA player wanted to play. Players claimed they didn’t like the weather, the traffic, the media and the taxes. But in reality, there again was no chance of winning a championship. After years of trying to rebuild through the draft, the Celtics were back to square one.

The low point in the season probably was when Jordan’s offered its customers free furniture if the Celts won two games in a row - a feat they failed to accomplish. On most nights, the courtside seats normally reserved for celebrity fans went to street musicians and state reps. TV ratings sunk below Revolution games and “Hardball with Chris Matthews.”

Even Heinsohn has reached the end of his rope.

“We don’t have much talent,” Heinsohn said. “Which makes it that much harder to overcome rotten officiating.”

But tonight it could all turnaround. Just before the Pistons and Cavaliers square off in Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals, the ping-pong balls will fall into place and the Celtics will learn their fate. If they again land the top pick, they are expected to take Derrick Rose, the young point guard out of Memphis.

Unfortunately, without much talent or leadership around him, Rajon Rondo struggled through a horrendous sophomore season and the point guard appears to be a lost cause. Rose is only 19, so he’ll be expected to back up Marbury and learn from the wily veteran. Once the draft is complete, the Celtics will have to deal with another pressing issue. Their best player, Al Jefferson, still is demanding a trade.

“Obviously, we have hit rock bottom,” Thomas said. “Which reminds me: Did you check out the bottom on that new hottie in sales? Sweet.”

Said Grousbeck: “I just pray we don’t get unlucky to slip all the way to, say, No. 5. God only knows what we’ll do then.”

This year the team will be represented in Secaucus by Oden. He already was planning a bus tour of Atlantic City this week.
 
hehe

back to the manu v. stojakovic thing... look, obviously stojakovic was out played by manu. but there is a reason why the spurs put their best defender on stojakovic. all i'm sayin'.

he's a deadly shooter... and the argument i made was that if you put him with duncan, with all the looks that the spurs guards get even when duncan doesn't play well, like last night, just because timmay is timmay... it would be frightening.

all i'm sayin.


let's go balls!
 
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