Around the Rim - Playoff Edition

Aaaaand heeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrrre's Treeeeebor......


Here’s the last regular season post/playoff predictions… haven’t been paying too much attention 1st round hockey always grabs my attention until somewhere around June, then….meh. Anyways,

Yao Ming has been taking part in some Chinese experiments so that he can play in the Olympics…. Now there’s nothing to measure against in this photo but if his head is the only part of his body still the same size who’s going to be able to guard a 15 ft man ???



















(Ed. Note - There may have been some analysis of the Houston/Utah series here that got lost in the Internets. However, all that remains now is Trebor's prediction.)
UTAH in 6

Denver has a scary team… they got 2 players who can score 30-40 points each, any given night. They do also have good role players… problem may be getting Carmelo to the game... who cares if he’s drunk … what happens if the police are busy with actually police work and can't give him a ride
Lakers in 5.

The best series will be the Suns and Spurs… after last years terrible outcome, that caused lots of debate, and a ref scandal came out of it too, this year may not be able to live up to all of that, but an entertaining series nonetheless. The Suns went and got Shaq for this reason… Shaq vs Duncan... it’s like 2002 all over again. The only things I’m not looking forward to is, soon to be 6th man of the year Ginobli, take a run at big disel, hit him and then flop around on the floor for 2 mins. Kind of like the Oberto hit, though with Manu the hit wouldn’t need to take place for the same results
Phoenix in 6

Dallas and New Orleans??? Last night Kidd owned Paul and that may not be the case with the series but Dallas did catch a break playing against this young team. I really don’t know which way to go on this and I have no clips or news either.
Dallas in 6


The East

I’ll start by pointing out that Golden State - who are going fishing - have a better record than 5 of the teams in the eastern playoffs. Some people say that’s argument for the best 16 teams make the playoffs. I don’t like this idea and I doubt it will ever get addressed by Stern, with Boston beefing up this year, soon other Eastern teams will do the same and the shift might go to the East.

Atlanta, some months ago I said they had a shot at like #6 in the East - and they did but came up short, so now you face the Celtics, hope you enjoy your week in the playoffs.
Boston in 4

Cleveland clinched 4th with this play… it’s a long video but suck it up. The thing I hated seeing was Lebron's drive to the hoop. His head is down he picks the ball up at the 3-point line and goes towards the basket with his head down. What can a defender do?? One may say stand there and take the charge, but if you think that on a last second play Bron Bron is going to get a offensive foul called on him… please give me whatever it is your taking. On the upcoming series Barkley has come out after some comments by the Wizards and said this “"I think the Washington Wizards have got to be the dumbest team in the history of civilization." That’s coming from Charles, so you know that’s not a good sign.
Washington in 7 - I can only hope. They did split the series 2-2 during the season and that was without Agent Zero.

If the above call never happened, Philly probably gets the #6, however they fall to #7 and get to play the Pistons - who once again have been overlooked by almost everyone the entire season, they are too vanilla, not sexy enough… There’s no feel good story no controversy just a team that goes out and wins. Once playoffs start the media starts to realize again that the Pistons should be seen as the top team in the East. Though the series was split 2-2, as Chauncy says the real season starts now.
Detroit in 5

I can't complain too much because with the Philly loss the Raptors get the 6th spot and get to play Orlando instead of Detroit. Of any of the top 4 teams Orlando is the one I think the Raptors match up with and have a shot at beating. It’s a slim shot and I don’t think it will happen but there’s a chance that Mitchell will think when we had Calderon starting we were winning… we now are starting Ford and are a sub .500 team… and make the right call on the starting 5.

However, here are some quotes that will show where T.O is headed:

“Facing a Toronto team trying to lock up the Eastern Conference’s sixth seed, the Pistons pulled away down the stretch for a 91-84 victory Sunday, even though all five starters were resting comfortably on the bench.”

Now yes, the Pistons have a deep bench but to prove that you have problems here’s a quote after the Miami heat game

“Facing a team of relative unknowns, Toronto rallied from behind at halftime”

Rallied from behind!!!… The Heat starters are no good, can't imagine these unknowns being that good, one of the players didn’t even have a jersey he used tape for his number on a plain t-shirt. And it’s not as if these games didn’t mean anything, T.O is still jockeying for position. Some more tid bits of info, they are 9-17 in the past 26 games… not the kind of momentum you want heading into the playoffs. And another: since the All-Star break they have only beat 2 teams over .500
Magic in 6

Here are some fun clips that didn't make the posts before.

Milwaukee’s Bogut. Poor guy, maybe it’s a running joke, maybe no one likes him ??? I don’t know but it’s funny

Here’s something even funnier. You know how we're always making fun of Americans for not knowing their geography - well laugh no more, instead stop thinking like it’s 1990.

Corey Brewer – This one just makes me laugh.

There hasn’t been much to do with cheerleading but, here’s a little something.