Re: The refs have drastically favored the Heat so far.
 

LFTV, where do you live? in MI? any Piston fans from NY here? Seems like Park Avenue Country Club is the MI rendezvous, anyone know of another place?

Re: The refs have drastically favored the Heat so far.
 

Crap. Deja vu all over again:

link

The question is: Will we get this or this?

Re: The refs have drastically favored the Heat so far.
 

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The East is going to beat the West in 6 games.

Book it.

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Miami isnt going to beat either western team (should they get there). There will be tons of value in the western team.

Re: The refs have drastically favored the Heat so far.
 

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Its not a summary of a team based on one game.

Its the fact that they were up 3-1 against a Spurs team that was playing poorly especially on defense. They got taken to a game 7 and nearly blew a 20 point lead.


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I have a very hard time making an objective or "true" ranking of this year's playoffs teams. I like the Pistons, but I hvae a hard time considering them for first or second when they have such an aptitude for scoring under 70 points a game (and they so deeply rely on Rasheed Wallace to do even that!).

My sense is that SA is first until the Mavs do a little more to establish the final step to the top. There's no doubt that SA has the goods on both ends of the floor. More importantly, they have the killer instinct. They step up and make the tough shots in the big games when it's all on the line.

Dallas didn't hvae that in that series. They played scared when they were ahead and should have been closing. Everyone stopped hitting their shots, being nervous, and then they stopped taking their shots because they were missing. Nowitzki showed championship caliber obviously, but just him may not be enough to call them the better team.

For me the question is whether that game 7 represents them squeaking by almost flukily, or whether it will be a transformation--will be the basis for them to take the next step. Do they now have the cool and confidence to play big in the big game? (like Duncan, Ginobli, Parker, and even Sideshow Bob in his own way.) I like to think that they will. Maybe not. I'd say let's see if they put SA down easily next year, but of course Duncan and SA are getting older faster (I assume, not sure).

I think another reason Dallas is likely to be underrated is because a lot of their big performers are currently no-name guys: Howard, Terry, Harris. Non-marquee players. Give them a ring and a strong run into the next finals and everyone will say, Oh yeah I always knew Dallas was the real deal.

When SA one their first and some commentators said that one should get an asterisk in the record books, shouldn't really count, and even as far as their second I think, they got no credit partly because Ginobli and Parker were still nobodies.

And then the Heat. I like the Heat a lot. I bet Dallas over Heat for the final (put on in 2nd round, largely just b/c I liked them best). I rank them down a step or two because they don't seem coherent enough and have a lot of questoin marks. Shaq getting old. Questionable characters and other old guys (Williams, Walker, Payton--Mourning maybe). I have no idea how their true rank vs the Pistons. But it seems to me like Miami might come together and blow away in the finals, or it might not. But by next year the moment will be gone and they'll be thinking about rebuilding around Wade.

Re: The refs have drastically favored the Heat so far.
 

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LFTV, where do you live? in MI? any Piston fans from NY here? Seems like Park Avenue Country Club is the MI rendezvous, anyone know of another place?

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Chicago. Drove to the Palace for Game 7 v Cleveland. Tempted to do it again.

Re: The refs have drastically favored the Heat so far.
 

Walker and Williams are not old:

8 Antoine Walker F 6-9 245 Aug. 12, 1976 Kentucky
55 Jason Williams PG 6-1 180 Nov. 18, 1975 Florida

Basically the same age as Posey, and Billups, Raja Bell, Tim Thomas...younger than the Wallaces and Steve Nash.

Re: The refs have drastically favored the Heat so far.
 

Yah, my dad was at Game 5. If we can somehow come back to win this series, I'm flying home for the Finals. Don't wanna get ahead of myself though. We've got a long way to go.

Re: The refs have drastically favored the Heat so far.
 

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Yah, my dad was at Game 5. If we can somehow come back to win this series, I'm flying home for the Finals. Don't wanna get ahead of myself though. We've got a long way to go.

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I'm leaning toward not going Sunday (if they win tonight) b/c I'd rather not take the five-hour-post-elimination-drive gamble again, especially with a night game and work Monday.

Plus, Win = finals games to go to, loss = wish I hadn't gone to Game 7.

Re: The refs have drastically favored the Heat so far.
 

Don't book your flight.

Re: The refs have drastically favored the Heat so far.
 

The problem with your and Charlie's argument is that you can't have it both ways. You say the Spurs are one of the two elite teams in the league, but you rate the Mavs down for not putting them away in 5 games?

The Mavs got up 3-1 because they're an incredible team. They won two close games and had the only blowout of the series. The Spurs came back because they're also an incredible team, not because of any weakness of Dallas's.

Game 7 was a battle between two superpowered teams, and Dallas won that overtime convincingly, there was nothing fluky about it. They hit their shots, they played great defense, and they just had too much firepower down the stretch. The way they closed out that series should say all that needs to be said about killer instinct, not to mention the fact that they have the only sweep in this year's playoffs.

I can't for the life of me understand why one team needs to "dominate" the previous best team in the league in order to gain some kind of credibility. For anyone watching that series, it should have been clear that Dallas was at least on the same level as SA. If you're calling SA elite, you have to say the same for Dallas.