Three-point Daggers & T's

The NBA playoffs make much for water-cooler and coffee shop talk nowadays what with the great action and upsets galore. We’re already halfway done and there’s already much that we can glean from the games:

Nightrider sighting
The reason why the Dallas Mavericks lost is because it was David Hasselhoff who showed up not Dirk Nowitski.

What A Fool Believes
Tracy McGrady has gone the way of Kevin Garnett, a perennial first-round flop (although Garnett did advance deep once). What was he saying about, “It’s all on me?” I thought that it takes five, baby, to win. Guess he forgot that, right? Oh yeah, I forgot too that there’s no truth to advertising.

Sowing the Seeds of Playoff Chaos
Thinking of reseeding because you think that the conference finals should be between Detroit and Chicago and San Antonio and Phoenix? Thank God, the NBA play-offs have showed that the NCAA’s don’t have a monopoly on unpredictability.

There have been some calls from basketball observers that the NBA should either go back to the old format of the seeds being ranked according to their win-loss record or to take a cue from the NHL to reseed every round. The former might be acceptable but that paves the way for the stronger teams t figure in the conference semis and the finals. The latter is intriguing because a true champion should take on all comers but that renders the regular season slate almost useless. Whatever it is, I’m fine with the format now. I like that feeling of unpredictability.

A Bloody Shame
Steve Nash was playing on a bloody nose. Hitting a dagger of a trey. What does that say? MVP for THREE!

Sorry, Dirk. An MVP doesn’t simply play in the last two minutes of Game Five.

Lost in Translation
In his first season with the Cleveland Cavaliers last year, the 6-7 Montenegro native Sasha Pavlovic was asked during a game to play defense if he wanted to stay on the floor. The wiry shooting guard smiled and said, “My defense is my offense.” The Cavs’ coaching staff wasn’t amused and Pavlovic cooled his heels on the bench. After finally showing up in the Game One eastern semi-finals win against the New Jersey Nets scoring 15 points while wearing down Vince Carter, Pavlovic, in a play reminiscent of Tayshaun Prince’s block of a Reggie Miller lay-up, swatted Jason Kidd’s fastbreak lay-up that would have cut the Cavs’ lead down to two.

“I remember saying that (to Cleveland Coach Mike Brown), but I wasn’t serious about it,” said the 23-year old Pavlovic after the game. “He probably took it serious. That’s my fault. He knows I’m going to play good on offense. Only if I play good defensively, he’ll let me stay on the floor. So that’s what I’m trying to do all season.”

Bigfoot sighting
Did you read that news item about this Canadian Member of Parliament who said that Bigfoot must be declared an endangered specie? Well, here’s more evidence to support this astounding piece of public service. That guy in the Basketball TV plug who says that he Ioves the NBA game because of the Seattle Supersonics Sasquatch? What kinda crap answer is that?!

Gut feelings
The NBA ordered Golden State Warriors coach Don Nelson to stop bringing beer to the post-game press conference. Guess they’re worried about how this team has taken on the personality of former Warrior Latrell Sprewell with his fierce and irreverent demeanor aside from his jawing and dunking ways.

Bullied
The Chicago Bulls looked like world-class beaters after dusting off the Miami Heat in the first round. But against the Detroit Pistons… they looked like the Lost Boys in the first two games. In those two games, the Pistons stole the Bulls’ playbook: hustle plays, high-energy, and a team game that saw them record their best win-loss slate since 1998. They’ve been thoroughly outplayed almost everywhere in every facet. And so now they head back to the City of the Big Shoulders searching for answers and hoping that good ole home cooking will serve them well. There have been only seven teams in NBA Playoff history who have bucked a 0-2 hole to win in seven games. And one of those teams was the 1993 Bulls when they went two down to the New York Knicks in the Eastern semis.

But the glaring stat is that the Bulls are outrebounded and have committed more turnovers. Scott Skiles and his staff clearly have their homework done.