Catching Up on the NBA Playoffs

The blog has been a little light on content lately as I deal with the usual busy spring season with the real job (I know, who the heck cares about that)but staying up late watching the Grizzlies-Thunder triple overtime thriller on Monday night has inspired me to go overtime this week. Today we’ll catch up on the NBA playoffs and the shocking sweep of the two time defending champs. Tomorrow I will dive into the NHL playoffs and the lack of drama in the second round and finally on Friday we will catch up on the first quarter or so of the MLB season including your .500 Buccos! Now, on to The Association:

• The Lakers sweep at the hands of the Dallas Mavericks would not be so shocking if we just took a short look back on previous Kobe era flameouts. Pretty much every time the Lakers have lost a playoff series since Shaq and Kobe won their first three titles they have gone down with a bang. Starting with the 2003 Western Conference Semifinals loss to the Spurs, each time Kobe’s Lakers have lost a playoff series they have lost it in dramatic fashion. In that 2003 series, the Lakers lost to the underdog Spurs in six games including a 28 point loss to finish the series, they followed that up with a 5-game series loss to the heavily underdog Pistons in the ‘04 NBA Finals, a 31-point loss to the Suns in ’06 when Kobe quit in the second half of game 7, a first round loss in five games to the Suns in ’07 and a 39 point loss to the Celtics in game 7 of the NBA Finals in 2008. Throw in the embarrassing game 4 in the Mavs’ sweep this year and you can’t help but question the Lakers ability to compete when their backs are against the wall.

• What this says about Kobe Bryant in particular I am not real sure but for a guy who prides himself on his fierce competitive attitude, it has to be both embarrassing to him and counterintuitive to this perception for the rest of us. Could you ever imagine Michael Jordan going out like that? How about Larry Bird? Kobe’s place and legacy as a top 10 or so player of all-time is safe, but let’s forget about the conversation placing him anywhere near those guys. This is coming from a Kobe guy, mind you.

• The Lakers were beat by a pretty good team, though, so for as much as the story is about the Lakers getting swept, let us give credit to the Mavericks for a great series and a truly great shooting performance. Dirk Nowitzki is certainly enhancing his legacy as the greatest foreign born player of all time and he is quickly approaching the Charles Barkley, Karl Malone, Tim Duncan class as the greatest power forward of all time.

• If you haven’t been watching much of the Oklahoma City-Memphis series, do yourself a favor and make it a point to watch the final three games. I know many people may not have been intrigued by this series between the late start times and the lack of familiarity with these rosters but this series has been phenomenal from the start and could very well be the beginning of a fierce rivalry for Western Conference supremacy over the coming years. Both teams are loaded with young talent, highlighted of course by the Blog’s former poster boy in Kevin Durant. The fierceness and competitiveness of this series was in full display during Monday night’s triple overtime thriller that the Thunder were able to pull out to even the series. I still think the Thunder win this series because Durant is the best player on the court but I am hoping for our viewing pleasure that it goes the distance.

• A Dallas-Oklahoma City Western Conference Finals may not have the flare that any series involving the Lakers would have but it would be an absolutely fantastic series that I could see going at least six and probably seven games. I don’t think Memphis-Dallas would be as great for drama purposes as Dallas’ veteran presence and ability to match Memphis’ size in the post would make it a fairly short series in the Mavericks’ favor. Needless to say I am rooting for a Durant-Dirk dual in the Western Conference Finals.

• Over in the Eastern Conference we have seen much more of what was anticipated outside of the Hawks upset of the Magic in the first round. Chicago, Boston and Miami put away their series in relatively short fashion.

• It may be of surprise to some that the Heat are up 3-1 on the Celtics, but not to me. I picked the Heat to win the title before the season, I urged patience when they got off to a slow start, I stuck with them when they lost five consecutive games near the end of the season and I picked them before the playoffs began. Guess what, I am still picking them. They have the best player in the world (by a larger margin than most people want to admit) and the guy who is at a minimum in the conversation for the 2nd best player on the planet. You could put a couple of puppies around them and they could contend for the title but they have another top 20 player and a few veteran role players who have been through the gauntlet before. That’s why I have never really waivered from my opinion that they are the best team in the league. I thought the Lakers could give the Heat fits with their size but I guess we’ll never get the opportunity to find out. It would be fun to see the Thunder take on the Heat in the Finals, though, in what could become the beginning of many great battles between Durant and LeBron.

• I am putting the finishing touches on this post as I watch the Bulls and Hawks battle in game five of their series (Editor’s note: The Bulls pulled out a 95-83 victory with a strong fourth quarter). I am big fan of Derrick Rose. I think he is the point guard version of LeBron James with the ability to dominate the game with his pure athleticism, combining speed, power and quickness. Rose may have even deserved the NBA MVP for the contributions he made to his own team during the regular season (he would have been fourth in my personal ballot but ultimately I did not have a big problem with Rose winning the award). Watching the playoffs, however, we can see why he is still just a step below the Kobe, LeBron and Wades of the league. When Rose is on he is almost unstoppable but when he’s off he doesn’t have the ability to dominate the game in other areas the way the greats do. I think Rose could reach that potential, he already took one big leap forward on the defensive end this year, but he needs to improve his playmaking ability for his teammates and begin to dominate on the defensive end the way LeBron and Kobe do when their teams need it.

• The Bulls will probably get past the Hawks and advance to the Eastern Conference Finals but that’s where their phenomenal 2010-2011 season will end. I thought before the second round began that Boston-Miami was the real Eastern Conference Finals and watching this Bulls-Hawks series has just solidified that opinion for me. Start preparing yourself now for some over-the-top, can’t watch Sportscenter anymore hype when the Heat are battling the Mavs or Thunder in the NBA Finals.