Picking the NBA Championship
Everyone I've seen has been picking the Spurs to win the NBA Championship over the Cavs (well, not everyone . . . on TrueHoop, Henry Abbott's mom and two other guys picked the Cavs, although one apparently just picked them so he would have a chance of winning the "Stat Geek Smackdown" -- by the way, today Abbott linked to Flyer Fieldhouse, a blog that apparently is written by fellow Dayton alumni/Cleveland sports fans that looks pretty tight). At least Cleveland got some love from Michael Wilbon, who wrote this article for the Washington Post today. Everyone's saying the Cavs have a chance to win a game or two. Well, the time has come to set the record straight.
I'm not going to do any kind of statistical analysis -- best to leave that for the people who have more time on their hands. Brian Windhorst did his usual super-duper job of detailing the various Cavs-Suprs matchups (obviously, the Cavs have the edge at small forward with LeBron over Bruce Bowen, and Z give the Cavs a debatable advantage at center, even if Roger Brown would never admit it). This is just my from-the-gut projection of how the series will go.
Anyone who watched the post-game festivities after the Cavs beat Detroit in Game 6 Saturday night knows that the team (and the fans) are completely overjoyed just to be there. Some people are even saying that the Cavs' sense of satisfaction with simply making it to the Finals indicates a lack of desire and the fortitude necessary for upsetting the Spurs and taking the Championship. Early celebrations aren't great indicators all the time, though. This past fall, I watched the Cardinals win their NLDS series. During the postgame show, they doused their locker room with champagne while Tony La Russa wandered around the scene with a towel on his head. "There's no way the Cardinals are going to win the World Series," I told my roommate Nate Dogg. "They're so amped just to win their Division Series, they still have the NLCS and the World Series to go. They're finished."
Then, after the OSU men's basketball team beat Michigan at home to clinch the Big 10 regular season title, Tok, Tortoise, and I stayed to watch the 20+ minute post-game ceremony where the Big 10 trophy was awarded and the team and coaches cut down the nets. In my infinite wisdom, I proclaimed this a harbinger of bad fortune. "We're stupid to be this excited to win the conference title in a weak Big 10," I pointed out. "We'll be lucky to make it out of the Sweet 16." While I was partially right -- the Buckeyes were lucky to get out of that Xavier game alive -- avid readers of this blog will remember that OSU made it to the NCAA final, and maybe would've won if Thad Matta had made even a cursory attempt to get Greg Oden involved in the offense over the course of the season.
So yeah, it would be foolish to pick against the Cavs on a "they're already overjoyed to be here" theory. I'm also getting sick of reading that the Cavs are lucky to be in the Finals because they took an "easy route" to get there. First, they were the second seed in the East, so it wasn't like they could be expected to play the top two teams in the East. They only had to beat one team better than them -- the Pistons -- and they did that. Sure, Washington was horrible, but isn't a seventh seed supposed to be inferior, and didn't the Cavs sweep them? I think a lot of people under-rate New Jersey. After all, they did have Jason Kidd, Vince Carter, and Richard Jefferson on their team (and a pesky Mikki Moore), and even if they didn't have all of their Big Three playing their best for majority of the series, they did beat the third-seeded Raptors (who people loved before the playoffs started). Besides, the Cavs would've beaten them in five if they hadn't laid an egg at home in Game 5 (which ultimately taught them a valuable lesson for the Detroit series -- always keep your foot on the gas).
Detroit struggled offensively and showed some major cracks that perhaps indicate that the Pistons need a makeover this offseason. Doesn't anyone realize, though, that maybe the Cavs' underrated defense, the team's passion and intensity, and LeBron's unbelievable play were the major sources of the Pistons' offensive struggles and overall breakdowns? I'm also sick of hearing people say the Cavs beat teams -- i.e., the Nets and the Pistons -- that are fatally flawed and need to be blown up. People still say that about the Cavs (e.g., they still have no viable point guard, Larry Hughes isn't ever going to be healthy, Z is old, and LeBron still needs a scorer to serve as his Scottie Pippen).
Besides, can't you make the same general point -- that the Cavs took an easy route to the Finals -- about the Spurs? Didn't both teams beat only one "power" team from their conference (Cleveland, as Charles Barkley said, was about two plays way from sweeping Detroit 6-0, and San Antonio beat the Suns in a closely contested series that was heavily influenced by the controversial Horry-Nash "collision")? And can't you make the argument that they each also beat a team with multiple superstars that just couldn't play to the sum of its parts (New Jersey and Denver)? Sure, Utah was a much better team than the injury-depleted Washington Wizards, but it's not like the Spurs had to play Dallas (the best regular-season team in the NBA) or Houston (who had a better record than the Jazz and a guy named McGrady). The Spurs definitely had a tougher road than the Cavs, but it wasn't like they had to go through Jordan's Bulls, Magic's Lakers, and Walton's Trailblazers to get to the Finals.
A win is a win is a win, and a Conference Championship is a Conference Championship. Sure, you can say that the Cavs are the worst (or second or third worst, whatever) team to ever play in an NBA Finals. But if the Cavs win, does that then mean the Spurs are the new worst team to ever play in a Finals?
I guess the point of my rant is that the Cavs' path to the Finals means about as little as the fact that they are excited to be in the Finals. They did what they needed to do to get here. My final bone to pick with the prognosticators is that they say the Cavs' regular season sweep over the Spurs is meaningless. The argument goes, "The regular season is just the regular season and has no bearing on the Finals, and, anyways, the Spurs grew a lot as a team and were a much better team in the second half of the season than the first (when they played the Cavs) and -- by the way -- one of the Cavs' wins came on the second night of a back-to-back for the Spurs, and they never win on night two of a back-to-back."
The Cavs have proven they can beat the Spurs. Sure, San Antonio has better integrated this past offseason's additions since they last saw the Cavs, and, yes, they're a better team now than they were in January. But the same can be said for the Cavs. LeBron has grown by proverbial leaps and bounds. Boobie Gibson is playing significant minutes and contributing on a more regular basis. Big Z has stepped up his game in the playoffs. The two wins over the Spurs don't mean that the Cavs will win the series, but they do mean that the Cavs have shown that they can win the series.
"So," you're asking (if you're still reading), "You're going to pick the Cavs, aren't you?" Well . . . you're right. Here's how I see the series going:
- Game 1: Spurs win (the Spurs lead the series 1-0). LeBron is nervous, and the rest of the Cavs follow his lead. In a sloppy, turnover-filled game, the Spurs take a comfortable 10-point lead into halftime. The Cavs mount a series of mini-runs through the third and fourth quarters, but are never able to get it closer than 5. Skip Bayless cries tears of joy on TV Friday, and the media starts talking sweep.
- Game 2: Cavs win (the series is tied 1-1). Call this game "LeBron Strikes Back." Number 23 isn't nervous this time, and the team plays a much better game overall. It's back and forth throughout, and the Cavs prevail in a close one to even the series heading to back to Cleveland.
As a side note, it's critically important for the Cavs to steal one of the first two games of the series. The Spurs aren't the Pistons. They're not going to get overconfident if they win the first two games, and they won't let the insane atmosphere in Cleveland rattle them too much. If the Cavs come home down 0-2, they have a huge (although not insurmountable) mountain (bet you didn't think I'd write "mountain") to climb. Why? The Spurs are going to win one of the three games in Cleveland -- you heard it here first.
- Game 3: Cavs win (the Cavs lead the series 2-1). The Spurs actually take an early lead when the Cavs come out too fired up and play sloppy again. The home crowd won't back down, though, and neither will the Cavs. The game is close at halftime, but the Cavs take a small lead in the middle of the third quarter and somehow hold it until the final buzzer. Skip Bayless still rips LeBron on Wednesday (he hasn't won anything yet), but the rest of the media starts talking Cavs championship.
- Game 4: Spurs win (the series is tied 2-2). I told you they'd win one in Cleveland, didn't I? The Cavs look bad in this game, but really Pop's figured 'em out. Duncan has a big game. The media doesn't know what to think anymore.
- Game 5: Spurs win (the Spurs lead the series 3-2). More of the above. Cleveland fans vow to never watch Desperate Housewives again after ABC shows Eva Longoria for the 14,295th time. The media starts talking Spurs championship again.
Another side note: Am I the only person who remembers Eva Longoria's "I hate Cleveland" interview from earlier in the season (maybe the All-Star game?)? During the interview, she's asked question after question about Tony Parker (I'm thinking the interview -- which takes place in the stands -- was done by Mark Jones). Anyway, she talks about how much she loves Tony Parker and blah blah blah, and the interviewer finally asks her, "You love the Spurs and you love Tony Parker. But if he's traded to another team, would you root for the Spurs or his new team?" Eva replied, "I would follow him anywhere, except I wouldn't move to Detroit or Cleveland." I immediately called my mom and told her, "That's it, I officially really can't stand Isabella." (Eva Longoria once played a character named Isabella on The Young and the Restless, which my mom watched.) Back to the projection:
- Game 6: Cavs win (the series is tied 3-3). Against all odds, LeBron pulls off another classic game (not quite 48-points, but fairly close) to will the Cavs to victory. All of a sudden, and somewhat out of nowhere considering the last two games, the Cavs seem to have the Spurs' number, much like they did after Game 5 of the Pistons series. Still, these are the Spurs, so we can't get our hopes up too much, can we?
- Game 7: Cavs win. In a Game 7 for the ages, something finally goes Cleveland's way. The Cavs play great team ball. Of course, LeBron has a great game, but everyone seems to contribute. If this weren't really happening, it would be like someone made it up -- the team comes together and plays to its best capabilities at the most important time. It's really like it's scripted by Disney. During the final two minutes of the game, ABC keeps cutting back to a jam-packed Gund . . . I mean Quicken Loans Arena, where everyone seems to be covering their eyes during the close finale. After the game, there is nary a dry eye in Cleveland. Speaking of tears of joy, viewers watching the game in HD catch a few drops from David Stern's eyes as the commish hands the trophy to LeBron.
