Quality Hoops

That is what we are getting as NBA fans.

Games are entertaining and intriguing. The winners aren’t always obvious. Teams like Atlanta are beating Dallas, the Clippers (who I recall saying won’t be that bad, more on that later) are beating the Warriors, the Sixers are beating the Bulls. No one really mentioned this during the off-season but it was the moves by the bottom half of the L that has brought a rise in the NBA. Terrible teams last year are more than watchable, they also compete. Even Minnesota stuck with Denver for a while last night. And I for one am loving every second of it, I could almost talk about every game as I was flipping all over the place last night.

Maybe I will.

Have to start with the young Blazers of course but before I get to them…David Stern should feel like an idiot for not keeping the Hornets in Oklahoma City. For one it would eliminate the Sonics trying to move there and secondly you wouldn’t have half-full arenas. Just dumb. Back to the Blazers. On Tuesday night against the Spurs they showed the positive side, the high if you will. Last night against the Hornets, Blazer fans got to see what the low of this season is going to be like. Our youth and relative inexperience doesn’t always translate well on the road and this was a prime example. The D was lacking in a big way as NO’s perimeter players picked us apart and as team they shot almost 57% for the game. No ok. B-Roy bounced back but LaMarcus and Martell struggled to pick up the slack and the combination was enough to lead to a blowout. I’m still happier about it.

There were a few scores where you have to scratch your head and wonder what happened on Friday night. The biggest one to me was the Lakers shocking blowout over the Suns. Not becuase of any other reason than the fact that the Suns have owned the Lakers year after year. Now I’m not worried at all about Phoenix, maybe it is the Suns fans rubbing off on me but they will get their stuff going. If anything its good they face some adversity early. The shocker was that the Lakers won this game as a team AND without Lamar Odom. You of course can’t count on Bynum giving you 14 and 13 nightly and Radmonovic scoring 19 but last night was a reminder that the pieces are there. Even Sasha Vujacic scored in double figures which is impossible.

Golden State is really missing Steven Jackson, Sacramento is really missing Ron Artest and Miami is really missing D-Wade.

The Clippers have shown (like I predicted) they wouldn’t be as bad as people said they would. By the way, Chris Kaman is back people.

Those good things I said a couple days ago about New Jersey and Orlando….I definitely should have bit my tongue.

Coup still doesn’t buy into Boston and of course you can’t this early in the season, I just wish he would see the pieces that I do. We know about the starters, I was more impressed with their bench players. Those guys are veterans and know how to play the game. If they had one more shooter I’d endorse them to the Finals with ease. House and Posey (when he gets back) can both stretch the floor, Pollard and Scalabrine are smart and give effort and let us not sleep on Tony Allen. He can provide offense off the bench in a hurry.

Daniel Gibson saved the Cavs from dropping two home games to start the season. If they were playing almost anyone but the Knicks they don’t win. Somehow late in that game they kept leaving him open and he kept hitting threes. They can’t depend on LeBron dropping 40+ and Gibson hitting 5+ threes again all year. Zach Randolph’s line: 21 points, 14 rebounds, 10/23 shooting, 1-2 free throw attempts, 4 turnovers. I’m so glad I don’t have to deal with that anymore, have fun Knick fans. It was really fun watching that game with a Knick fan actually because I predicted what Zach was going to do. Awesome.