Some incredibly early observations from the young NBA season:
1) San Antonio is going to win the whole thing. It's over. Don't even bother watching anymore. That being said, can there be a MORE boring team in the NBA? No, wait. Can there be a MORE boring superstar than Tim Duncan? Good Lord. These guys make an AA support meeting seem like a fraternity party in comparison. Duncan makes a James Lipton interview look like an interview with Richard Simmons. And, with that, I'm officially out of analogies.
Tim Duncan, in his most recent interview
2) Remember the Jeopardy skit on Saturday Night Live where Sean Connery gets to select an answer from Alex Trabek, and the category is "Therapists?" If I were to guard Kobe Bryant in a game, I would say to him, in my best Sean Connery voice, exactly what Sean said during that skit: "I'll take 'The Rapists' for $500, Alex." Seriously, if you want to know all you will ever want to know about Kobe Bryant, read this month's article in ESPN The Magazine (or Bill Simmons' NBA preview on ESPN.com) regarding Kobe and Phil Jackson and the Lakers. Kobe wants people to start calling him The Mamba. Do yourself a favor and read it. While I'm on the subject, if you Google "Mamba," result #2, Mambaonline, claims to be "South Africa's most stylish gay lifestyle portal." I can't make this stuff up. Coincidence?
3) Teams that need time to come together, but will be tough to beat come March:
a) Miami Heat -- The Shaq injury hurts their progress (not to mention KILLS my fantasy team).
b) Sacramento Kings -- Okay, so I didn't get a chance to do my preview on them before the season started. My bad. At any rate, once the bench learns how to play together, and once they learn to play a little defense, and once they learn to get the ball in Brad Miller's hands on every possession, they'll be fine. Granted, that's a lot to ask of this team, especially the "defense" department.
c) Milwaukee Bucks -- My pick for the team that NOBODY will want to play in the playoffs. The addition of Jamal Magloire two weeks ago solidifies their frontline and puts them as the early favorite for the 4-seed in the East. I'm going to admit this right now (and these are words I never thought I would say in a sentence): I'm on the Milwaukee Bucks bandwagon.
4) Best Nightly Highlight Reel Team: New Jersey Nets. Okay, the jumping abilities of Vince Carter and Richard Jefferson are just ridiculous to begin with, but then you add Jason Kidd throwing perfect alley-oops from all over the court? Seriously, I want to see Kidd throw one from an opposite-court inbound pass this year. No, really, I do. These guys make three or four plays on a nightly basis that require immediate 8-second rewind on TiVo.
Nightly, on SportsCenter, you can find this man...
5) Larry Brown will have Stephon Marbury traded by Christmas. Write it down. Place a bet on it. I'm telling you, this is not even a question.
6) The Eastern Conference is quickly catching up with the Western Conference in terms of talented teams. The way I see it, the East has three legitimate title contenders in Detroit, Indiana, and Miami. They also have three teams that are one piece away from making the leap into upper-echelon status in Milwaukee, New Jersey, and Washington.
7) I can't believe I just said that.
8) Out West, I really only see one title contender right now, and that's San Antonio. Granted, my eyesight isn't the best, and I don't think I'm a basketball expert. So, let me rephrase: Out West, San Antonio is the only team I would bet money on right now if I were in Vegas. Dallas, Houston, and Denver all have potential, but all have glaring weaknesses at this point.
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1 comment:
You're a crazy person. Just because East coast teams get to play east coast teams and look good doing it doesn't mean the East is catching the West in talent. You could take the 9-12 seeds at the end of the year from the West and put them into the 4-7 seeds in the East.
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