NBA Playoffs 2008 - Round 1

[teke184 0]

Two of those 2-0 series are about to become 2-1 series...

 

The Raptors have the Magic down by 16 late in the 4th, while the Wizards are kicking the living shit out of the Cavs in the 3rd, 72-47.

[naiwf 0]

Looks like TMac's pulling his 4th Quarter Houdini act again.

 

 

Edit: I may have spoken too soon.

[teke184 0]

T-Mac is coming up short, but the presence of Rafer Alston for the first time in this series is making a HUGE difference, IMHO.

[Broward83 0]

Rockets up by one.

 

They'll fuck this up and lose.

[teke184 0]

Rockets up by one.

 

They'll fuck this up and lose.

It would be an accomplishment to do so at this point...

 

They're up by 2 with 0.2 on the clock.

 

 

They need a Hail Mary of a 3 to win or an incredible pass-shot combo for OT.

[Broward83 0]

Yeah, at this point in time... they've got it in the bag.

 

That miss and Utah almost scoring... yeah.

 

 

Edit: This was not a T-Mac victory. Fuck that strained labia having bastard. Thank the lord for Rafer and Landry.

[alfdogg 0]

I really wanted to see McGrady get swept. Oh well.

 

Also, I hope Cleveland wins the next two games. The sooner I don't have to see DeShawn Stevenson anymore, the better.

[Ripper 0]

Why do people hate T-mac again?

[TheOriginalOrangeGoblin 0]

I like his "It's my fault a few people ordered Heineken but got Budweiser" line. It's funny.

[alfdogg 0]

Mostly due to the fact that he acts like a total bitch when faced with the slightest criticism. This can be evidenced by his whiny rant before the series started, which basically amounted to "Look at how much higher my stats are in the playoffs, it's not my fault my scrub teammates aren't raising their game the same way!" Which is true, to an extent, but if he's the great superstar or leader that he claims to be, you have to accept some responsibility for your failures, as well as your successes. He's cut from the same mold as his cousin, right down to quitting on his previous team.

[Ripper 0]

Mostly due to the fact that he acts like a total bitch when faced with the slightest criticism. This can be evidenced by his whiny rant before the series started, which basically amounted to "Look at how much higher my stats are in the playoffs, it's not my fault my scrub teammates aren't raising their game the same way!" Which is true, to an extent, but if he's the great superstar or leader that he claims to be, you have to accept some responsibility for your failures, as well as your successes. He's cut from the same mold as his cousin, right down to quitting on his previous team.

 

Come on Al. Every year the story of a Tracey McGrady team going to the playoffs is that he hasn't been out the first round. He gets ALL the criticism. When they went on the 22 win winning streak it was "The Rockets banded together without Yao and went on this winning streak"

 

He doesn't get the superstar success aclimation but he does get the superstar criticism and its not even accurate criticism.

 

And he averaged 28 points, 6 rebounds and 5 assist in the year he "quit" on the Magic. That is still taken from a interview where his comments were taken completely out of context. He said his heart wasn't in it and he wasn't giving his everything ont he court. The next line was about how the night he score 60 something points that season, his heart wasn't in it that night. He found it hard to leave everything on the court while you were losing.

 

he was being honest, but its not like he was out there playing like crap. He put up better numbers stats wise than he has in Houston.

[TheOriginalOrangeGoblin 0]

Vince is much worse than Tracy. Tracy, for all his whining, has hit his ceiling talent-wise. He just isn't good enough to be THE guy on a championship team. Vince always was and, possibly, still is. He just never gave a damn enough to live up to how good he was. Biggest waste of talent in NBA history. So I can never see Tracy being on Vince's level.

[Rendclaw 0]

This is the backlash of the Jordan era.

 

Every SG/SF that comes out nowadays that has a great amount of talent all of a sudden has to have that "I'll snap my own grandmother's neck to win" mentality, or has to have the extremely rare ability to put the team on his back and take over in the 4th quarter of games like Jordan did in order to be great. Talent and a desire to win are not enough anymore, now it has to be a combination of talent and a desire to win at all costs. The bar is set for these guys way high, almost impossibly high for most.

 

I thought how T-Mac was treated at the end of his stay in Orlando was fucking stupid. He might have wanted to leave anyway (not that I blame him, really), but if he is leaning towards leaving, you don't plant your hand in his back and give him a shove out the door. T-Mac is not without blame in that situation, especially when he didn;t back up his talk about winning that playoff series against the Pistons in 2003 (I think).

 

I do think that T-Mac is a little sensitive about getting blamed when his teams aren't as successful as people want them to be, but I can't blame him too much, when he has been dealing with this for at least five years, especially in the playoffs. As good as he is, no one man can ever win it all by himself. Jordan couldn't until he got Scottie Pippen to play off of him and take enough heat away from Jordan.

 

That, and getting better players around them, too. Kobe can't do it, LeBron certainly can't.

 

At least T-Mac is trying to keep things upbeat by joking about it, but you know he has to be thinking "oh here we go AGAIN."

 

Vince Carter is nice offensively, but he is not a good defender to be nice about it. That and he is used to getting his way, and when he doesn;t it translates to his performance on the court. See his situation in Toronto.

[PUT THAT DICK IN MY MOUTH! 0]

Tracy, for all his whining, has hit his ceiling talent-wise. He just isn't good enough to be THE guy on a championship team.

 

I have to (somewhat) disagree with this. I think in terms of pure talent Tracy's right up there with the likes of Kobe. His problem is that his body is just too brittle and injury-prone these days to allow him to take full advantage of that talent. I think this is the main reason you see him settling for jumpers so much instead of driving to the rack like he's so capable of doing. In the back of his mind he knows that if he lands wrong or gets bumped hard there's a mighty big possibility that he ends up tweaking his ankle/shoulder/whatever.

[bobobrazil1984 0]

Here's an interesting question, well at least rendclaw will find it interesting and those assesing T-Mac should make them think too... if you were the Pistons, and you went down in the playoffs again, lets say round 2 to orlando... and you got offered T-Mac for Rip Hamilton and say antonio mcdyess or a draft pick or something, would you do it?

[Ripper 0]

I don't think Tmac makes that team better. I think a more focused approach on certain players offensively insted of spreading the wealth would actually help them more.

 

But yeah, I think that Tracy McGrady's injury problems are the biggest thing. He would be one of the best in the league and healthy McGrady is good enough to be THE guy on a championship team. He is a superstar. he just can't do it by himself.

 

I personally think Vince Carter is over bashed mostly because of how he treated Toronto on the way out. Of course ignoring the Toronto press accusing him of faking injuries and booing him while he played hurt MIGHT have had something to do with that.

[Guest blame that goot.]

This is the backlash of the Jordan era.

 

Every SG/SF that comes out nowadays that has a great amount of talent all of a sudden has to have that "I'll snap my own grandmother's neck to win" mentality, or has to have the extremely rare ability to put the team on his back and take over in the 4th quarter of games like Jordan did in order to be great. Talent and a desire to win are not enough anymore, now it has to be a combination of talent and a desire to win at all costs. The bar is set for these guys way high, almost impossibly high for most.

I have a couple problems here. First of all, I find it hard to believe that the concept of talented athletes trying to win at all costs did not exist prior to 1990. Second of all, you call this a backlash, which has a distinct negative connotation. I want a league where the best are playing their hardest. Why should anyone settle for anything less? I don't think the bar is impossibly high. Replacement-level talent plays to win at all costs. Why shouldn't superstars?

[Broward83 0]

My problem with McGrady is that he seems to always go down with an injury. Its as if you whisper MVP or "playoffs" in the Toyota Center, he just crumples up and has to sit on the DL.

 

His "I'm Sorry" comments? It was childish and not needed. He wants to call out the team? Then fine, call out the team and man up and say "I've done what I can, if the team can't pull their own weight, then start blaming Scola, Battier and the others. I'm not the only one here..."

 

What he did could've (if it already hasn't) seperate the team and give more fodder for people who don't like him to start bitching about a trade.

[Steviekick 0]

This is the backlash of the Jordan era.

 

Every SG/SF that comes out nowadays that has a great amount of talent all of a sudden has to have that "I'll snap my own grandmother's neck to win" mentality, or has to have the extremely rare ability to put the team on his back and take over in the 4th quarter of games like Jordan did in order to be great. Talent and a desire to win are not enough anymore, now it has to be a combination of talent and a desire to win at all costs. The bar is set for these guys way high, almost impossibly high for most.

I have a couple problems here. First of all, I find it hard to believe that the concept of talented athletes trying to win at all costs did not exist prior to 1990. Second of all, you call this a backlash, which has a distinct negative connotation. I want a league where the best are playing their hardest. Why should anyone settle for anything less? I don't think the bar is impossibly high. Replacement-level talent plays to win at all costs. Why shouldn't superstars?

 

My spin on Rendclaw's point is moreso that the league wants to find their Jordan sequel for marketing purposes. Jordan was an unbelievably talented SG/SF who had the ability to carry and take over for his team. The league made a lot of money being Jordan-centric, and apparently Stern and his marketing guys are like someone who can't get over an old girlfriend.

 

Endorsement and promotion wise, they favor any superstar level SG/SF, like Kobe and Lebron, and the lesser ones like Wade, Carter and McGrady (and we'll throw Carmelo Anthony in here for the hell of it). They always get compared to Jordan, and the media covers them accordingly. Denver, Lakers, Miami and Cleveland each had twenty nationally televised games this season.

 

Everyone wants a league where the players are playing their hardest. So if your going to be labeled a Jordan-esque player you have to play accordingly. If you can deal with that, you'll be fine, like Kobe and Lebron. If you can't, you become the BUTT of everyone's jokes, like McGrady and Carter.

[Precious Roy 0]

So I just saw on the ESPN pre-game that Josh Howard admitted he smokes pot in the off-season. He also said a majority of NBA players do the same thing. He'll get vilified by the media I'm sure, but it's not like he said anything that everyone doesn't already know. Jalen Rose could barely contain his laughter when commenting and was basically like, "Josh Howard is a dumbass for blowing his cover" and they didn't even bother to ask Baron Davis who's probably baked out of his mind right now.

[Matt Young 0]

This is the backlash of the Jordan era.

 

Every SG/SF that comes out nowadays that has a great amount of talent all of a sudden has to have that "I'll snap my own grandmother's neck to win" mentality, or has to have the extremely rare ability to put the team on his back and take over in the 4th quarter of games like Jordan did in order to be great. Talent and a desire to win are not enough anymore, now it has to be a combination of talent and a desire to win at all costs. The bar is set for these guys way high, almost impossibly high for most.

I have a couple problems here. First of all, I find it hard to believe that the concept of talented athletes trying to win at all costs did not exist prior to 1990. Second of all, you call this a backlash, which has a distinct negative connotation. I want a league where the best are playing their hardest. Why should anyone settle for anything less? I don't think the bar is impossibly high. Replacement-level talent plays to win at all costs. Why shouldn't superstars?

 

My spin on Rendclaw's point is moreso that the league wants to find their Jordan sequel for marketing purposes. Jordan was an unbelievably talented SG/SF who had the ability to carry and take over for his team. The league made a lot of money being Jordan-centric, and apparently Stern and his marketing guys are like someone who can't get over an old girlfriend.

 

Endorsement and promotion wise, they favor any superstar level SG/SF, like Kobe and Lebron, and the lesser ones like Wade, Carter and McGrady (and we'll throw Carmelo Anthony in here for the hell of it). They always get compared to Jordan, and the media covers them accordingly. Denver, Lakers, Miami and Cleveland each had twenty nationally televised games this season.

 

Everyone wants a league where the players are playing their hardest. So if your going to be labeled a Jordan-esque player you have to play accordingly. If you can deal with that, you'll be fine, like Kobe and Lebron. If you can't, you become the BUTT of everyone's jokes, like McGrady and Carter.

That's why Lebr

 

.................

 

[Steviekick 0]

And Matt Young just proved why I can't talk on the phone and post at the same time.

[Damaramu 0]

So I just saw on the ESPN pre-game that Josh Howard admitted he smokes pot in the off-season. He also said a majority of NBA players do the same thing. He'll get vilified by the media I'm sure, but it's not like he said anything that everyone doesn't already know. Jalen Rose could barely contain his laughter when commenting and was basically like, "Josh Howard is a dumbass for blowing his cover" and they didn't even bother to ask Baron Davis who's probably baked out of his mind right now.

 

Damn, let's just legalize it and end all these headaches. That's a whole other debate though.

 

Funny thing. People think you are a pothead if you want it legalized. I don't smoke it at all(haven't since 9th grade) and I advocate it being legal.

 

But, why would Howard say that? I mean shit. Just play basketball and get high when you want since you obviously get away with it when you keep your mouth shut. I wonder what the Mavs will do? Then again Cuban's probably baked right now too.

[Matt Young 0]

I just imagined it was something amusing like you getting distracted by a flying plastic bag or some crazy animal, mid-sentence.

[Steviekick 0]

That happens to me all the

[Steviekick 0]

Sixers are holding up well against the Pistons. Surprisingly the crowd is pretty dead.

[teke184 0]

CP3 is the "silent assassin"?

 

At least they didn't describe him as "silent, but deadly"...

[Steviekick 0]

And the Sixers head into the half with the lead for the first time.

[Kurt Angle Mark 0]

Reggie Evans playing out of his mind and getting "Reggie, Reggie" chants from the Philly crowd

 

I have seen it all

[Precious Roy 0]

The 6ers have totally outplayed the Pistons for 3 quarters, hopefully they don't get comfortable and take their foot off the gas.

 

On a related note, Flip Saunders is absolutely terrible.