old posts revisited

I wish there was a way to know if an old post was revisited. Like, it goes back up to the top or something. For example, if Iwasn't right now saying, "i added a huuuuge post to jimmy's 'get rid of imaginary lines blog'." No one would ever know about it:)

Best pic

does anybody have a picture that can compete with THIS?
i'm pretty sure this is my favorite so far...
look at shaq's face. priceless.

Once Again...

these guys seem to be playing pretty well together, but my concern is this:
every time i look at the box score, melo has taken way more shots than ai but ai has just as many or more points than him(not to mention a more impressive stat line otherwise).
i know that melo is concerned that the nuggets remain "his team", but come on...
i'll even go so far as to say this- melo isn't shit compared to ai.
there. i said it.
am i the only one that thinks melo's insistance on the nuggets being "his team" is just setting them all up for disaster?
i heard him talking about it the other day and he sounded like a child talking about HIS team, HIS shots, HIS points, etc.
seriously, i know he's really talented, but at some point doesnt the maturity level kick in and sabotage childish players?

Adidas vs. Nike

Who would win?

For Adidas, you've got the It Takes Five five -- Chauncey Billups, Gilbert Arenas, Tracy McGrady, Kevin Garnett and Tim Duncan.

For Nike, you have to choose five from the guys walking around the airport tarmac. We'll go with Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Jermaine O'Neal and Amare Stoudemire.

I gotta go with Adidas. That front court is too much.

Dullstone's Neat-o Stat of the Night

** I was thinking instead of posting cool stats on their own threads, i should jsut add to this one. Since these aren't really conversation starters. So, this is heavily edited to adjust for that***

1-26-07:
Duncan was the man last night, 9 blocks is amazing. To bad he just missed that triple double.

But, oh my god, Jamal Crawford was completely unconcious, making 16 shots in a row. He's gonna wake up and say, "i did what last night!" Make sure to watch the video of his shooting clinic. Career high 52 points. 66% shooting, 8-10 for the arc.

Rockets vs Spurs

Got to watch the Rockets almost blow a big lead again to the Spurs. They managed to hold on and win mostly because T-Mac shot 104%. Actually he shot 58%, but close enough. That makes two games in a row that the Rockets have won in SA. Which is funny because I don't think they've won in SA since 1997 or something like that.

Another weird thing is that the Rockets and Spurs each have one person on the injured reserve. Yet the Spurs brought 15 players to the game tonight and the Rockets only 10. Where are all the other Rockets? The Spurs only played 11 of their players but the Rockets only played eight!

Kind of odd. Anyone have an explanation for this? Maybe this happens a lot but it seemed kind of weird to me.

Who's Jersey?

Dont' worry, i won't flood these boards. Just had a few things on my mind right off the bat.

If you could get any NBA player's jersey, whose would it be? Feel free to be indecisive. Oh yeah, if you already have one/some, say whose it is; and, say whose you want.

I would either go with Iverson's Denver Jersey (though i wish Nugget jerseys were cooler looking) or Dwight Howard (i love this man, jsut wish he'd stop handing over the ball. Of course, he only jsut turned 21). I perhaps would also go for a pistons one instead. either Prince or Billups.

Only Basketball Jersey I have is Chris Webber. From when he was at UofM. Its a rather tight fit though, got it in 6th or 7th grade.

Grant Hill

**Erased and moved here from Jake's last thread.

I just wanna say, i am very happy grant hill is healthy again. That man was too good to suffer with injuries the way he did (4-5 ankle surguries, plus other pain).

Every since he went to magic its been very rough. B4 this season he missed 368 games out of 500. Im always glad to see the old doods come back strong after years of injuries. He doesn't rebound and assist like he did, but he looks good driving to the hole.

He's a real class-act too. Among other many other things, I was just reading, he appearantly was the vice-chairman of the 1999 Special Olympic World Games.

It has also been great watching McDyess and Mourning playing well after possibly career ending injuries.

anyone else?

Iverson further proves his studliness

Iverson moves into 30th on all time scoring list. One of my favorite things about the NBA is when Iverson does a double crossover and makes defenders trip over their own feet.

20,000+

Many of yous probably seen this already. But there is lots of cool info here under the links of old-timers. I liked seeing at what position in draft certain players went. Moses Malone: 3rd Round!!!

All i really know about Bynum is

that he is big. last night kobe got 42 points and the lakers beat GSW. no big deal. what catches my eye though, is bynums line:
4-4 fg, 10pts, 15rebs, 4 blks, 4ast
all in 32 minutes.
looks like a KG line or something. and this guy is how old? jeez.

Coach Jake and Coach Patrick

Yea, I can't believe it either. Jake and I talked about coaching a team on Sunday, I looked around the web on Monday and just like that, we have a team. The kids are gonna be 6th graders which means they will be 13 years old. First practice is Friday at 6. Thats when we get to actually look at our team. I can't wait.

I think we may start off with the basics: dribbling, travelling, pivoting

It all depends upon what they already know. I can't remember, but it seems like I knew most of that stuff by the time I was 13.

In terms of strategy, I'd like to focus on rebounding and limiting turnovers. If you win those two stats, you have a really good shot at winning.

Woot!

M-A-N-U

As I sit around my mini altar to Manu it comes to me that he may be the worse best player I have ever seen. I love that it does not matter if the Spurs are down fifty or up by one, Manu is going hard. I love that he has no real weakness in his game, he does everything well and some things great.
Manu has no fear, never goes half speed, never gives up, and that will be his downfall. He will never last as long as most of the greats, but he will be great.

Does this count?

I know this blog is for NBA, but I just had to mention this kid Kevin Durant at UT that I heard about on the radio. He's 6'9", 225 lbs, plays guard and forward. Here's his stat line (all numbers per game):

24 Pts, 11 Reb, 2 Ast, 2 Blk

He's 6th in scoring in all of college basketball. And oh yeah...he's a FRESHMAN. This guy could be a monster in the NBA.

Stats for us Geeks

I noticed that a number of us are freaking addicted to statistics. I was once told that I should have been an economist because I can wade through mounts of stats and make all kinds of nonsense out of them. I'm currently working on my 'unified court theory' but until it's completed, an ESPN guy, Hollinger, is supposed to have some pretty cool statistical equations; Simmons has mentioned him a few times at least. Anyhow, he's got a Power Rankings now that I figured us nerds would be into, if you haven't already seen it:

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/hollinger/powerranking

The most valid point he made in the description is the human element (anyone seen that Dow commercial btw... ironically one of the best I've ever seen). Shaq & Carmelo coming back, etc. Though as they start playing, the equation seems to fix itself over time.

Now I'm going to have to read through his archives to find more good'uns.

p.s. If anyone knows of a statistical DB for the NBA playoffs, please let me know. It may contain the vital final missing data structures needed to supply my 'unified court theory' the info it requires to PREDICT the FUTURE!

Oh oh, home team rant day!

Alright, so the Rockets lost to the two best teams in the NBA. Thats no big surprise. What IS a big surprise is that they were leading in both games through the 3rd quarter. Thats something I can look at and wonder what could have been if they were just healthy.

If you hadn't heard, Tracy was out against the Suns due to his back. So much for that quack's gaurantee. However, he did blow up for 45 against dallas before he tweaked it. If the rest of the rockets had shown up that night, the rockets win going away. Tracy had 17 field goals, and the rest of the rockets combined had 17 field goals. Whats up with that! Too many road games thats what.

So, they come home and lead the Suns for 3 quarters. How are they leading when they are missing their two superstars!? I'd like to submit that the rockets are a deep team.

Which brings me to my next point. I know everyone has been raving about the Suns lately, but I want to point out something. They played exactly 7 guys last night. If any of those 7 guys (cept for jones) goes down to an injury, this team is only average. Furthermore, I think they are more likely to go down to injury due to their style of play and this simple equation:

More possessions = More chances for injury

Here is my bold prediction. Suns lose one of their 6 guys for the season and lose in the first round.

Keep in mind, we are just past half way through the season.

How do you make purple icing?

who is this bynum? why wasnt i told that the lakers have a strong young giant who answers to the name of 'Bynum'? dang that guy has potential. you know jer, by the way they murdered my spurs last night, i wouldnt be surprised to see your lakers earn you a purple and gold cake this year. if they can make it past odom's absense and bury smush parker under a pile of bynum's dirty jock straps (and sneak some polonium into steve nash's wheaties) i think they have a pretty good shot.
which brings me to my next sad point..

what the hell happened to my spurs? even considering the limited minutes that Pop is rationing out, i'm just plain unimpressed with this squad. timmy is the only one who shows up every night. we have possibly the best supporting cast in the NBA (that's what i thought before the season started) and not even one of them is doing what they were hired to do. even the best and most consistent of them (oberto,ginobili, parker) aren't playing championship ball. don't get me wrong; i like all these guys and i would love to see them bring home another banner. i just don't think they are playing well enough this year to do it, limited minutes or not.
does anyone else think the spurs look lazy and unorganized this year? maybe i'm crazy, but timmy can't do it by himself. (i think the lakers can vouch for that)

the way its going now, i'll be surprised to see SA beat a healthy LAL, HOU, UTA, or DAL. they are all playing WAY prettier and more consistently. now all they have to do is band together and find some polonium.

Injury Report

Well, it wasn't easy and I may have missed a few, and it sure is ugly (how do you do tables?) but here is my compilation of injuries thus far this season. I restricted entries to high inpact players and 4 or more games missed.


Least Hurt:

Minnesota
Pheonix
Portland
Philly
Chicago
Washington

Most Hurt:

New Orleans
Los Angeles Lakers
Boston



What would the Hornets look like if they weren't hurt! They are like Houston last year.

Its been pretty ugly, as far as injuries go. Hopefully it will stop here...though thats not likely.

Who has the most ridiculous name?

so i've been looking into this issue for a while, and here's what i've come up with:
mike dan tony- i've mentioned him before and he may end up winning the crown for his 3 first names
dick buttkiss- an oldy but a goodie.
tony barony- a newcomer to this challenge, the coach of the memphis grizzlies
jimmy johnson - no explanation necessary

please submit more names and let me know who really has the most ridiculous name ever
this is of the utmost importance

MVP predictions revisted, EFF

Has anyone looked at the Efficiency statistic much when talking about MVP? Seems like if you take the top efficiency players you have a pretty good starting place for MVP. Here are the current leaders:

PLAYER NAME       TEAM  GP MPG   PTS   EFF   RPG  APG  STPG BLKPG EFF48M EFF 
1 Kevin Garnett   MIN   34 38.4  22.5  29.6  12.5 4.4  1.2  1.94  36.5   29.56  
2 Dirk Nowitzki   DAL   37 37.5  24.4  26.9  9.4  3.1  0.6  0.65  35.96  26.92  
3 Dwyane Wade     MIA   29 38.0  27.6  26.9  4.6  7.9  1.7  1.24  33.49  26.9  
4 Carlos Boozer   UTA   36 37.0  22.0  26.8  11.7 3.1  1.0  0.36  34.79  26.75  
5 Yao Ming        HOU   27 32.7  25.9  26.5  9.4  2.1  0.4  2.22  36.76  26.52  
6 Carmelo Anthony DEN   22 35.2  31.6  25.8  5.6  4.1  1.5  0.41  33.03  25.82  
7 LeBron James    CLE   35 40.7  26.8  25.5  6.7  6.1  1.5  0.8   30.16  25.54  
8 Kobe Bryant     LAL   34 38.7  28.0  25.5  5.4  5.4  1.3  0.38  31.39  25.47  
9 Gilbert Arenas  WAS   35 38.8  30.0  25.4  4.4  6.4  2.1  0.09  30.28  25.37  
10 Shawn Marion   PHX   35 38.2  19.4  24.7  9.5  1.7  2.0  1.43  30.78  24.69  
11 Steve Nash     PHX   33 35.5  19.6  24.5  3.2  11.3 0.8  0.03  32.9   24.54  
12 Tim Duncan     SAS   37 33.9  19.9  24.4  10.1 3.3  0.8  2.0   34.22  24.38  

Couple of points regarding EFF:

1. If one of these players doesn't win MVP this year I would be very surprised. Another argument for a Steve three-peat is that this is his best EFF rating year. The two years that he won MVP he was ranked 13th and 16th in EFF.

2. Keving Garnett almost always finishes first in EFF. Two years ago he finished with a 32 EFF.

3. Here is a snippet from the Wikipedia article on Player Efficiency Rating:

Hollinger has set up PER so that the league average, every season, is 15.00, 
which produces sort of a handy reference guide:

*A Year For the Ages:    35.0
*Runaway MVP Candidate:  30.0
*Strong MVP Candidate:   27.5
*Weak MVP Candidate:     25.0
*Bona fide All-Star:     22.5
*Borderline All-Star:    20.0
*Solid 2nd option:       18.0
*3rd Banana:             16.5
*Pretty good player:     15.0
*In the rotation:        13.0
*Scrounging for minutes: 11.0
*Definitely renting:      9.0
*On next plane to Yakima: 5.0

Notice that 30.0 is supposed to be a runaway MVP season. Yet KG almost always gets near or above 30.0 and he's only won the MVP once.

4. If you look at EFF per 48 minutes Yao Ming has the highest rating this year with a 36.76!

5. AI is only 23rd in EFF and T-Mac is 44th! So maybe EFF isn't everything. Still, I bet one of the guys listed above will win MVP.

The Suns are Hot! (literally)

I actually watched part of an NBA game the other day. I checked out that PHX-CLE game. Man did Cleveland get demolished. The Suns were up 91-59 at the start of the 4th quarter. It's funny how bad the East is. Cleveland has the best record in the East (22-13). Meanwhile there are 6 teams in the West that have more than 22 wins right now. Six teams! Just sad. This season especially makes a good argument for my no divisions theory.

Also to note: Steve had 21 assists in that game and he only played 30 minutes! That is foolishness. He only played 63% of the game. If he had played the entire game he could have had 33 assists. :)

Although the Suns look good I just don't know if they can beat SA or DAL in a 7 game series. The Suns are kind of like the Colts of the NBA. They have an explosive, flashy offense, a great general (Nash) and they always win a lot of games in the regular season but never win any championships. Maybe this year will be different.

Predictions - Mark

I think Phx and SA will be #1 and #2 and have a fairly easy road to the Western Finals. The East is a wash: a few good players, a lot of bad teams

East (Does it really matter?):
Mia over Orl

West:
SA over Phx

Finals:
SA over Mia

Fantasy Team NBA

I'm a huge proponent of team chemistry, especially in the NBA, so it got me to thinking. The All-Star game is fun to watch but I honestly believe you're never seeing a team that would great. If you're a GM and had a dream team to make up (of active NBA players), who would be your starting 5 and backup 5?

Starters:
C- Tim Duncan
PF- Dirk Novitski
SF- Lebron James
SG- Josh Howard
PG- Kirk Hinrick

Bench:
C- Dwight Howard
PF- Kevin Garnett
SF- Lamar Odom
SG- Shane Battier
PG- Chauncy Billups

Andrei Kirilenko
Elton Brand
Dwayne Wade
Kobe Bryant

I tried my hardest to avoid too much ego and to make sure that all players would play defense (even though Dirk's D is ugly he tries hard). The last few are honorable mention though I'd be hesitant with Kobe; the only reason he's not throwing tantrums this year is because he's the only real star on his team. Don't know if he'd coexist well on this team.

With the exception of Dirk, again, maybe this could be our Team USA? Anyone want to poke holes?

This guy is playing out of his head.

Dikembe Mutombo rejected five shots to move ahead of Kareem Abdul-Jabbar into second place on the NBA's all-time blocked shots list Wednesday night.

19 Rebounds, 7 of them offensive.

The guy is over 40 years old!

Here is a quote from the old geezer.

"It's amazing, just the way I'm playing,'' said the 7-foot-2 Mutombo. "Even to myself, I'm sitting down like, 'Whoa, is Mutombo really playing like that?' I haven't seen myself jumping for a rebound like that for a while.''

Predictions - Jer

I usually reserve my calls until the all-star break... but oh well:

East

CHI vs. CLE

West

SA vs. DAL

Finals

SA vs. CLE

Champs

SA

Does suck about the seeding though... those matchups may happen in round 2 so I guess the Finals picks are the ones that really matter.

Mid-Term Predictions

East
Detroit vs Cleveland
West
San Antonio vs Phoenix
Finals
Phoenix vs Detroit

and steve takes it home with the MVP, finals MVP, and the ring
Phoenix wins it all

Halfway thru...Time for some predictions!

Lets see what everyone think the season will end up like. Post your eastern and western conference finals teams and who you think will win it all.

Eastern Conference Finals

Detroit vs Washington

Western Conference Finals

Pheonix vs Houston

Finals

Detroit vs Pheonix

Pheonix is NBA Champions 06-07

MVP revisited

can anyone think of a candidate that might prevent steve from 3peating? i dug around the statpage on nba.com for a while and i don't think anyone is even close.
20ppg, 3rpg, 11ast, 52%fg, 50%3ptfg (and that % comes with taking and making more 3s than pretty much anyone else. the only guys that are close in 3s made or attempted are nowhere near steve in the other stat categories)
i mean...
that's pretty tough to beat, right?

all i'm saying is this:
there's not a team in the league that wouldn't gladly feed their own pointguard to a shark or grizzly bear at the chance to recruit this guy.

Quote of the night

Tim Duncan on whether not having Tony Parker made a difference in their game...

"It had a big difference. We won the game,'' Duncan said in a deadpan tone about Parker's absence. "I think that says something. We need to trade (Parker) or get rid of him or something.''

I love Tony...especially his teardrop...but I've always said he's not a true point gaurd. I know Timmy was joking, but I would say that they lost that Dallas game because they didn't have a general on the floor.

Also in news...Manu blows up with 6-8 from 3 point land. This guy never ceases to impress.

Get rid of imaginary lines - they're silly (long post)

What if the best teams made it to the playoffs? That would be cool. I have a radical idea that no one else seems to share. Do away with all Divisions and Conferences. We don't need them. They are just arbitrarily decided. I'll admit that in basketball the East and West is a good way to split up the teams. But look at Baseball and Football. What makes a team AFC or NFC, AL or NL? Some stupid old tradition.

Does anyone really care if their team wins their division? The only reason you care is because it guarantees a spot in the playoffs. But wouldn't most teams with a record good enough to win their division make the playoffs anyways? And if they only win their division because the rest of the teams in it suck, what happens? Everyone complains because they're in the playoffs only because of a weak division. And what compounds the matter is that teams normally play more games against teams in their own division. So if your division stinks not only can you climb to the top of it easily, but a good portion of your wins come against crappy teams.

The whole thing is silly. The best 16 teams should make the playoffs, end of story. The only reason to maybe keep divisions are the rivalries. Which I think could still exist without the divisions, due to geographical proximity or something.

Take a look at what the playoffs would like if the season ended today. I have played out the entire playoffs with the team with the better record advancing to the next round just as an example. To make the comparison to my system I have seeded all 16 teams according to their record (instead 1-8 for East and 1-8 for West).

Under the current system:

Round 1
E (7) Detroit vs (14) Milwaukee; (17) New Jersey vs (9) Chicago
E (10) Washington vs (11) Orlando; (8) Cleveland vs (13) Indiana
W (1) Dallas vs (15) Golden State; (4) SA vs (5) LA Lakers
W (3) Utah vs (6) Houston; (2) Phoenix vs (12) Denver

Round 2
E (7) Detroit vs (9) Chicago; (10) Washingon vs (8) Cleveland
W (1) Dallas vs (4) SA; (3) Utah vs (2) Phoenix

Round 3
E (7) Detroit vs (8) Cleveland
W (1) Dallas vs (2) Phoenix

Finals
(7) Detroit vs (1) Dallas

Under my system:

Round 1
(1) Dallas vs (16) Minnesota; (7) Detroit vs (10) Washington
(5) LA Lakers vs (12) Denver; (3) Utah vs (14) Milwaukee
(4) SA vs (13) Indiana; (6) Houston vs (11) Orlando
(8) Cleveland vs (9) Chicago; (2) Phoenix vs (15) Golden State

Round 2
(1) Dallas vs (7) Detroit; (5) LA Lakers vs (3) Utah
(4) SA vs (6) Houston; (8) Cleveland vs (2) Phoenix

Round 3
(1) Dallas vs (3) Utah; (4) SA vs (2) Phoenix

Finals
(1) Dallas vs (2) Phoenix

Couple of things to note here:
1. I ranked NJ 17 because they have the 17th best record in the league. They're not even .500 for goodness sake!

2. I included Minnesota in my playoffs because they have the 16th best record and are at least .500. Sorry NJ, that .419 record wasn't cutting it.

3. The Finals now if there were no upsets would be Dallas and Detroit. Which sounds good except that Detroit is much worse this year. You have the #1 seed playing the #7 seed in the Finals! Dallas's record is .160 points higher than Detroit's!

4. In the current system Utah and SA don't make it past the second round. They are two of the best teams right now!

5. I'll admit that the first round under the current system is a little better matched but only in the West because all of the teams are so good. Which leads me to my next crazy idea...

Get rid of the first round of playoffs. Yeah, I said it. Having 16 teams (more than half of the league) going to the playoffs is ridiculous. Every year there are a couple .500 teams that make the playoffs and sometimes a sub .500 team. The playoffs should be a reward. Not to mention with the exception of last year the first round of the playoffs is usually a joke. Having Dallas play Golden State right now would be hilarious (except for Golden State fans). The only occasionally good matchup is the #4 vs #5. And in the first round of the 2005 playoffs two matchups ended 4-0 and three ended 4-1.

Besides, players and many fans already complain about the playoffs being too long and how it's almost like a second season. Here is what I propose instead...

There are 30 teams. Get rid of the divisions all together. Everyone plays each other 3 times during the regular season for a total of 90 regular season games. But only 8 teams make the playoffs. So I added 8 games to the end of the regular season but subtracted 4-7 games from the end of the season. Then 8 teams with the best records make the playoffs, straight up. If two or more teams tie for record then compare their head-to-head records. One team will have gone 2-1 or 3-0 against their opponent.

So here is how the playoffs would look now:

Round 1
(1) Dallas vs (8) Cleveland; (4) SA vs (5) LA Lakers
(3) Utah vs (6) Houston; (2) Phoenix vs (7) Detroit

Round 2
(1) Dallas vs (4) SA; (3) Utah vs (2) Phoenix

Finals
(1) Dallas vs (2) Phoenix

Now every matchup is good. I would also be for a 60 game season where every team played each other twice. I'll end with a quote I found from a sports writer:

If someone suggested that Major League Baseball junk the National League versus American League format in the World Series, its fans would go ballistic. This fan included, being a traditionalist.
But the NFL playoffs would sure be a lot more attractive next month if the NFC didn't receive six playoff berths automatically. The four best teams in football are in the AFC...

I say change them all. Comments?

Post-Pre-Seas-Predictions

Well, I haven’t kept up with basketball too much this season yet, with the exception of the Lakers, but now that that the new year has started, I expect to begin to see the pattern weaved into the fabric of time more clearly leaving memories that become legend and fade to myth and a wind will rise to mark a beginning...

uh… that was odd... anyhow...

Because of my inattention to this point, I believe I can, relatively honestly, make a post pre-season prediction about the playoff hopes. I do remember that I’d definitely picked Chicago vs. Dallas in the Finals though it’s more likely that one of the Western Conference series’ will be a better representation of what the Finals were meant to be, the best two teams in the league squaring off (Dallas/Suns? or Dallas/Spurs?).

(i wish this thing supported columns)

West

1. Mavs
2. Spurs
3. Lakers
4. Rockets
5. Clips
6. Suns
7. Hornets
8. Nuggets

East

1. Pistons
2. Nets
3. Bulls
4. Cavs
5. Magic
6. Knicks
7. Wiz
8. Heat

My predictions as of today though look like I made some glaring mistakes. I’m huge fan of good coaching and defense when it comes to strength once the playoffs have started so I underestimated the Suns and Wizards big time as far as regular season power. I’m also kicking myself for not having the Jazz in the lower 3 as well as they have great coaching and defense. I never would have predicted the heights they’ve achieved thus far. They look to me like the Pistons did 2-3 years back – great example of a *team*, with very good defense all around.

With the advantage of seeing injuries now, and a small trade, I can say that the Hornets are out of it, the Rockets are facing rough times for the 3rd year running (I really thought this could be a great year for them…), and the Nuggets are officially intimidating.

As for the East, they were much more difficult for me to gauge in general. I thought the Pacers (coaching) and Bucks (talent) both had a chance but I gambled on the Knicks (still playing worlds better than last year), thought that the Nets’ defense would be better than it is, and couldn’t bring myself to knock the Heat out of the playoffs (even though I knew they were all decrepit and were going to fall apart at the hinges).

All of that said, my updated playoff predictions:

West

1. Mavs
2. Spurs
3. Suns
4. Jazz
5. Lakers
6. Nuggets
7. Rockets
8. Clips

East

1. Pistons
2. Wiz
3. Bulls
4. Nets
5. Magic
6. Cavs
7. Pacers
8. Knicks

Injuries are always a wrench in the works so we’ll see how they play out through the progression of this season. Thus far though, they've made a solid Rockets start into some big question marks, the Hornets into noncontenders, and my Lakers into a .500 club for now. It does look like the Rockets and Lakers will have significant amounts of time (2+ months; 30+ games), barring further injuries, at full capacity to solidify their team play prior to a playoff push so either one could be a dark horse in my mind due to their defense. I'd love to place the Nuggets higher but I'm not sure they'll have enough games left before they start clicking together. And they don't play defense. Regardless, they will be worrisome come playoffs. My big gamble is still the Knicks while the smaller one is that the Clips will start playing to their potential. We'll see about those, they both have their own issues...

Spurs V Mavs

Tonight is a big game. spurs v Mavs any predictions? I'm kind of up in the air on this one. The Mav's are firing on all cylinders right now.

Comments?

Does anyone want to post in the comments section? I've done it a few times, but if we want to keep it all on the front page, I'm down with that.

How bout that tmac?

looks like the whistle is about to fall out of that ref's mouth.

we've been saying it for years now: "can you imagine how good they would be if Tracy and Yao were healthy at the same time?!"
but seriously, if this doctor is correct, and tracy is never going to have back problems again, could we be looking at a rockets championship?
even with McGreaty (sorry) healthy and Yao doing 30 and 12, is it enough to beat PHX, DAL, or SA in a 7game series?

Patrick?anyone? could Luther, Shane, and the rest of the guys give enough support? Jimi's got a point; they look great lately. But are they good enough?

How bout them Rockets!

Rockets have won 4 in a row now. With no Yao Ming! In the last 3 games Tracy has scored 31, 38 and 31. Of course they haven't played anyone that was very good. Hopefully Yao will be able to come back and play at somewhat the level he was at before the injury. Can you imagine if both T-Mac and Yao were healthy?

Look at this stat line:

Player	Pts	Reb	Ast
T-Mac	20	5	6
Yao	26	9	2

And T-Mac has really just started to heat up. If they continue to do well in January that will be amazing. They play Utah, Chicago, Phoenix, Dallas, SA and Denver twice. What's hilarious is that the Rockets have a better record than anyone in the East. That's right, the Rockets! And they're the 6th seed in the West. Ridiculous. This of course is another reason that having conferences and divisions is silly.

P.S. - I finally found the article that Patrick had mentioned about T-Mac and his nearly constant back problems. Apparently his doctor has guaranteed that T-Mac will never have another back problem again. Here is the article:

Update: McGrady's rehabilitation specialist, John Patterson, said that barring a violent collision, McGrady's latest back spasms incident will be his last, the Houston Chronicle reports. Patterson worked on McGrady for about 2 1/2 hours last Friday, with McGrady reporting he felt much better as soon as he got up from the table and ever since.

Recommendation: "What we did is make sure what caused the back to go out in the first place," Patterson said. "Once we located that, we used passive resistance I call 'synergy release therapy.' Basically, it's looking for what caused the soft tissues or muscles to retract and correct that... My main point is to rehab them so they don't get hurt again the same way," Patterson said. "And then, it's to prevent another injury because biomechanics are not right. It's basically a combination of biomechanics and a microcurrent machine. Between the two, you can make it heal faster and prevent it from happening again." "I haven't had any flare-ups," McGrady said. "We'll see, but as of now, I feel good." Keep McGrady in your lineups, though expect a little bit of rust in the short term.

Reap The Whirlwind

That is right I'm here to one who told you all The Heat would win it last year. So much for Patrick's Rocket's prediction, so much for Richard's MVP prediction.

AI in Denver sick I mean SICK what is this world coming to?

3s indeed

This picture was taken right after CLE beat SA yesterday. I should be upset that lebronkeykong knocked my spurs out, but oddly, I am not. If Jimi's prediction is correct, then the #1 seed in the eastern conference has their work cut out for them, and beating my precious spurs is a great first step. SA did a good job of containing Kong(19, 5 and 5 on 7-17 shooting) and if you consider how ICE COLD we were from 3pt range, I don't see it as that bad of a loss. I mean, I honestly was expecting our record to get tarnished sooner than later. With the limited minutes Popavich keeps his guys on at the beginning of every season (wisely, I might add), I was surprised to see SA winning as many games as they did. funfact: only 3 guys on the spurs roster are avging more than 30 min/game and none of them are avging more than 35. The only good team i was able to find with similar stats in this area was DAL, and even they give their starters more min/ game than SA by a considerable margin.Dirk plays more than any SA player, and the guy that gets the least amt of court time for SA (jacque vaughn, whose minutes are ramping up lately quite a bit) still plays 7 min/game (compare to DAL, who has 4 guys that get less than 5 min/game).
This turned into a spurs rant. sorry. i'll move on now.

I'm very excited that Jimi can take time out of his 120 hour work week to talk with us about these important issues. And even more excited that he will soon be my neighbor.

I really like your approach to evaluating 3s, Patrick. I think it would be folly to overlook 3s per 48 min, and also I agree that it would be inaccurate to use only that stat. Furthermore, I second your opinion that Barry is #1, but even with these recent and needed changes to our way of looking at 3s, I'm not sure the formula is perfect yet.
Maybe we should take into consideration who is on the shooters team; for instance, Nash and Barry both have several other guys on their teams that are capable of making 3s, whereas Luther isnt so lucky (since tracy has been gone, he's pretty much been the goto guy on 3s, right? can we even mention battier here? ). I don't know- this kind of reminds me of the G Arenas situation. I can't blame him for taking some ill advised shots (since nobody else on his team has a better chance of making it) but that low % is holding him back from really standing out.
If Nash was the only guy on his team that could hit a 3, wouldn't he have more attempts, and most likely, a lower %? And it's not like it's Nash's fault that he's on a team full of shooters- he's just playing the hand he was dealt.
If I'm barking up the wrong tree, let me know. Its just that I think there should be a comprehensive formula to really let us know who's more valuable from long range. any thoughts?

New look at 3 point specialists

So, I was contimplating the per 48 minute statistic after seeing that Mutumbo is second in blocks per 48 at the age of 40 something. I thought I'd take a look at how our 3 point shooters look per 48. So I went to our good neighbor NBA.com. Isn't it so nice that they make it easy to grab the stats and throw them in excel so we can do things like this.

Here are the top 10 3ptrs made per 48 min.



The number on the left is their ranking by 3pt percentage.

I like looking at new ways to determine who is the best 3 point shooter. So far I would go with Barry. His stats just continue to shine no matter which way you look at them. Kapono may have the best percentage right now, but he isn't even in the top ten on 3pt made, 3pt per game, or 3pt per 48. To me, if you aren't taking and making a lot of 3ptrs you shouldn't be considered. Then I realised, if you aren't playing a whole lot of minutes, that shouldn't really take away from your not making a lot.

It continues to be a battle between Barry, Head, and Nash. Barry's got the lead. Nash is easily in 3rd.

First post of 2007

Ha! I beat both of you to the punch by posting the first entry for 2007! And I've only watched two NBA games so far this season. I don't know if I'm even qualified to post here.

Fortunately, my New Years resolution is to work less so I should have plenty more time to watch some games. That coupled with the fact that I will live in the same apartment complex as Jake and 3.1 miles away from Patrick as opposed to 10.0 miles should vastly increase my ability to watch basketball.

It was great to talk some NBA at the cabin this weekend. Certainly the highlight was Tom's unveiling of "LeBronkey Kong". That was classic.

Here are my picks for seeds, I tried to mix it up a bit:
EAST:
1. Chicago
2. Cleveland
3. New Jersey
4. Miami
5. Detroit
6. Orlando
7. Washington
8. Indiana

WEST:
1. Dallas
2. Phoenix
3. San Antonio
4. Denver
5. Utah
6. LA Lakers
7. Houston
8. LA Clippers

I read that they changed it so that the 1-4 seeds are the three division champs and the team with the best record remaining in the conference and that these four teams are seeded directly by record. That means that someone could be ranked #2 seed and not even win their division. Which I love. I will talk more about this in my next post.

Peace.