NBA Playoffs Thread

not all experts picked Miami. some experts on here were ready to trade LeBron, Wade or Bosh in Dec.

 

I'm talking about as a preseason prediction. Almost all "experts" and sports books had the Heat as the NBA favorite to win the title when the season started.

 

i hear ya. i was just remembering the way some people were reacting when the Hear were around .500 in mid December.

 

Give them the title but it's not like they even lived up to the hype in October when people were syaing they might win 70 plus games. They didn;t even win 60. That said, they were the No. 2 seed in the East, so it's not so shocking that they are here now. They will be a good NBA champion nothing more nothing less. They are not even in the Top 50 of all-time teams just yet.

 

huh?? not in the top 50. this is 2011. so if they beat Dallas (a team that swept the defending champs) in say 5 or 6 games you'll say they're the worst NBA champs since when?

 

doesn't really matter. just that i thought it was a little over the top when people were saying, fire Spoelstra, break up the big 3, Miami sucks, etc. in Dec. now if they win people will say nowhere near one of the all-time great teams or shit like that.

 

Because only 50-year-old, rich GMs get to move players around like pawns and make genius picks like Sam Bowie, Shawn Bradley and Darko Milicic and signing an over-the-hill Gail Goodrich and then giving up the rights to Magic Johnson (as compensation) and acquiring Don Ford for the rights to James Worthy. Can't let the players act as their own GMs. Bad for the game, you know.

If someone makes an outlandish, unrealistic prediction that doesn't come close to coming true, criticism should fall on the person making the prediction ---- not the players who didn't "live up" to the stupid prediction.

It gets lonely here in Logic World sometimes.

 

Ya, it's not like LeBron and the boys made any ridiculous predictions before the season.

 

If they did, we do not know it yet. In June 2021, we should.***


*** That's assuming, of course, you are taking the statements made to Heat fans literally --- as a prediction --- and not in the spirit in which they were attended, which was something to get them excited. It was a bleeping Pep Rally, for crying out loud.

And at least they didn't "guarantee!" anything, which is more than can be said for many athletes.

 

So I guess the Celtics titles with Bird, McHale and Parish are pretty hollow, too. Same with those won by Russell, Cousy, Sharman, Havlicek, etc. Or those with Worthy, Jabbar and Johnson. Or the Sixers win with Erving, Cheeks and adding Moses. Hollow, all I'm sure......

One clarification on the pre-season predictions--while the Heat was probably the favored choice to come out of the East, I think the Lakers got more love to take the championship than the Heat did.

 

I am okay with them joining up, because as Van Gundy said on the broadcast, they did exactly what we as individuals would want, the opportunity to work where we want. Its what the Yankees have been doing since George Steinbrenner first got the opportunity (Reggie, Catfish, Messersmith, Winfield, etc.)

 

They practice hard. They play hard. They work on offense. They work on defense. Anything short of a championship they will view as a failure. They provide entertainment for your entertainment dollar. Nothing they did prevents any other team from drafting or trading for or signing the best players they can to compete with them. Cleveland has picks 1 and 4 in the draft. Don't fuck it up (but you will). Some team will sign Chris Paul, and that team likely will already have another star and should be a championship contender in 2012. And on it goes and has always gone.

If that undermines the credibility of the league, I really am on the wrong planet.