We’re nearing the draft. It ain’t gonna look pretty and I put this off way too long to go through explaining each one.

MOCK DRAFT

Chicago- Derrick Rose, my pick would be Beasley just because he fits the system much better. I also am a big Captain Kirk fan. However, Rose, is a local and probably will be a fan favorite. This leaves them with a lot of problems considering they just re-signed Kirk Hinrich to a big deal. Hopefully they will shop him because I would love to see a change of scenery for him

Miami- Michael Beasley, The questions about his seriousness are pretty ridiculousness and I am sure Minnesota is salivating at the idea of having Michael Beastley fall down to them at 3. Pat Riley has given indications that he likes OJ Mayo better and supposedly D. Wade and OJ have become good friends in their meetings. However Beasley is too great a talent to pass up, something could be in the works if this pick is made in shopping Shawn Marion, possibly for Elton Brand which would most definitely bring stability to this roster.

Minnesota- OJ Mayo, Not surprisingly, my favorite player in the draft. After the first round SC collapse there were questions about him and the hype surrounding him. However, within recent weeks, whether it be through workouts or interviews or meetings, Mayo has become the most sought after player in the draft, arguably above Rose and Beasley. It is something that us in Southern Cal have always known, but to me out of all thee draftees Mayo has the most NBA ready game. While not necessarily at the point, but in terms of toughness, competitiveness, defense, shooting ability, and athleticism, his game is the most developed. No surprise that at seasons end he was projected 7th, if not lower and now he is almost a lock to be within the top 3.

Seattle- Jerryd Bayless, To me, he is still a year away from having any success in the NBA, but people may see somethings that I am not seeing. He probably has the best court vision and pure point guard instincts out of all the players in the pack, but like many he has not really even seen that much time playing the point. There are questions about his leadership and to me he is far too small to play effectively in an immediate fashion. He is probably one of the fastest guards available and has great finishing ability.

Memphis- Brook Lopez, His stock has dropped like a lead balloon. Its something everyone in the Pac-10 could tell whenever they saw him play. He doesn’t go after the ball with much intensity and questions surrounding his leadership are abundant. He has a very good jumper from 10-15 feet out which leads me to believe that if he can really get his head in the game with the right coaching he has the opportunity to develop into at least a decent starting center someday. He has good physical tools and excellent sense on the offensive end of the ball.

New York- Russell Westbrook, Jumpshot is questionable. However, PG’s who play defense are few and far between these days and Westbrook is extremely athletic. He has a good nose for defense. I was not really convinced, just because for most of his career he hasn’t shouldered much time as a true point guard. There is not much to draw from either way as to whether or not he can handle full time duties running an offense.

LA Clippers- Eric Gordon, LA needs scoring from their guards. Mobley is a complete bust and if Maggette does not come back or if Brand gets traded away, the Clippers are gonna be in some big trouble. Whoever gets taken here is not walking into a very promising situation.

Milwaukee- Joe Alexander, May be a reach. Purely based on the idea that Milwaukee’s biggest need is a SF. Joe Alexander is a great player for intangibles. He plays with intensity and desire. Physically, he has nice long arms which make him an able defender and a decent finisher. Not much else is very consistent.

Charlotte- Danilo Gallinari, Despite the efforts of Jason Richardson, the team is still in desperate need of shooters. The team has a lot of other needs, but at this spot Gallinari is the best player available. He has a great mind for basketball and has good capability handling the ball as a point forward when the need arises.

New Jersey- Kevin Love
Indiana- D.J. Augustin
Sacramento- Anthony Randolph
Portland- Alexis Ajinca
Golden State- Darrell Arthur
Phoenix- Donte Green
Philadelphia- Mareese Speights
Toronto- Nicolas Batum
Washington- Kosta Koufos
Cleveland- Chris Douglas-Roberts
Charlotte- Ryan Anderson
New Jersey- Jason Thompson
Orlando- Brandon Rush
Utah- Roy Hibbert
Seattle- Courtney Lee
Houston- Robin Lopez
San Antonio- Mario Chalmers
New Orleans- Bill Walker
Memphis- Javale McGee
Detroit- Nathan Jawai
Boston- Kyle Weaver

Miscellanea concerning the big day…

The draft order is always changing. Apparently there is something big going on between Toronto and Indiana with Jermain O’Neal in the mix. In NO MOOD to explain or think about.

Big time bust for this draft:

Kevin Love, Anthony Randolph, Roy Hibbert, Kosta Koufos

My booms of this draft:

OJ Mayo, Eric Gordon, Mario Chalmers

Sleeper:

Alexis Ajinca, Jaycee Carroll, Devon Hardin, Reggie Williams

Overall, if he can find the right place, I really think Eric Gordon will be the gem of this draft. He is by far, physically, the most complete guard. He has a very smooth jump shot, though he will get a bit trigger happy at times. On top of that, people do not realize how strong and fast he is. In college, he could practically get to the hoop anytime he wanted to, but he would settle far too often for the long range jumper.

• No Team has ever come back from 3-1 to win an NBA Finals. It has happened in the Playoffs though, many times, most recently by the Suns in that very memorable series a couple years ago against, wouldn’t you know it, the Los Angeles Lakers
• I don’t think anyone knew the Lakers were gonna come out this flat. Even people who picked Boston thought it was going to take at least 7 games. Who woulda thought?
• Pau Gasol and Sasha Vujacic are just another examples of trashy Euro soft basketball. Whens the last time you have actually seen Pau Gasol take a charge or go chest to chest with a driving defender, rarely. He usually backs off and tries to go for the block. When he does take contact, I almost don’t want him even to go through the trouble because he makes it look as if he is getting pounded up the ass. Maybe its just me.
• Vujacic, though not as bad, showed that hustle does not always equal great defense. Sometimes that burst of energy off the bench is crucial, but when you combine it with the situation he was put in, energy + choking= total failure. He played terrible terrible defense against Ray in the last few minutes. You could tell he was flustered and completely lost focus in the heat of the moment. He forgot proper defensive positioning and did not slide to stay in front of his man, choosing instead to try to go for a steal that was not there and then making a poor attempt at trying to fool Ray, passing him off to his equally Euro soft teammate Pau Gasol.
• The whole Celtics team came out like a man on fire and Paul Pierce showed me intensity I never thought he had in him. Before the series everyone talked about the KG, Kobe intensity matchup, I dont think anyone ever expected Pierce to show up with perhaps, really, his most inspired performance of these Finals and probably of his career.
• The Lakers inexperience is what did in the end. The triangle is a difficult, structured, and highly regimented offense, when you have a young team that is giving up a large lead and is slowly and surely choking, to ask them to play the triangle leads almost certainly to failure. The typically smooth running, passing, driving, offense of the Lakers became bumbling and highly mistake prone.
• Kobe did his best, but he’s probably still, almost 24 hours after the game, drunk off his ass. Paul Pierce did a great job, but Kobe needs much more help from his teammates. That really is not saying much because he was playing with absolutely nothing. Every possession that he did not touch the ball, it was turned over or they faced a desperation shot at the end of the shot clock. At the very least, when Kobe had the ball, as poorly as he played, he got to the rim or got a good look. Check that, his teammates were worse than nothing, they did not even give him screens or space the floor well enough, allowing the Celtics to pack the paint and make life extremely difficult for Kobe.
• Phil Jackson, this is serious business. Realize the youth of your team and how quickly that game took a turn for the worse. Phil Jackson’s hands off let them play it through attitude became a detriment to the team last night.
• The Lakers have yet to play a good game and the Celtics have at least 2 and a half. Its surprising in a series when one team does not ever play a good game, that usually means that the level of competition is wildly inequal. I think when most of us looked at the NBA Finals Eastern Conference-Western Conference matchup, we thought the level of competition was wildly inequal, except in a far different way.
• If the Lakers don’t come out to play in Game 5, Phil Jackson’s legacy will seriously be tarnished. That whole caveat of only being able to win with the best talent will almost be absolutely confirmed. A Phil Jackson team, pretty much swept, in an NBA Finals is not only unimaginably difficult to picture, but also just downright embarrassing.
• Please tell me I am not the only one who thinks James Posey looks like the Mask from V for Vendetta.

Exhibit A:

my god, uncanny…

-E

http://hardwoodparoxysm.blogspot.com/

check it out, its not much for the eyes, but its definitely a good blog.

Brought up a good point too that I hadn’t thought about (believe it or not, it happens a lot)

“Another observation I made was that Phil Jackson has never coached a team with this much youth this late into the season. Even those Bulls teams had plenty of older, P.J. Brown types to help right the ship and act as calming influences. This team is still extremely green (no pun intended) and are not yet deserving of all of Phil’s trust. They came up big in the 4th quarter, but in reality, Jackson only seems comfortable playing his starting 5. I think he gets the cold shakes every time Luke Walton has to try and guard KG. Although the Lakers have been super-efficient until now, perhaps all the media pundits, myself included, overlooked their extreme youth. Boston is much more a traditional Phil Jackson team. And Doc Rivers is proving it.”

Thats all, I put a lot of emphasis into how much PJ had the matchup dominated, but this is a great point.

For me, this was the first of any of these Finals games that I did not loathe watching. The final score shows that it was a gritty game, like most of the last few, filled with fouls and broken plays, but I enjoyed it.

A couple things I noticed that may or may not have played a role in the game:

Ray Allen, probably the smoothest man in Basketball, showed up again. In a playoffs where he could have still been in Seattle hanging out with KD and the gang and we wouldn’t have known the difference, these Finals he has been far and away the Celtics most consistent players. Contrary to those days in Seattle where defense was a far far far afterthought, he has been playing really solid defense (as solid as you can against Kobe) to the point where, even though he got burned, Doc Rivers trusts him enough to play him straight up against Kobe. Sometimes it worked as it had in Boston and sometimes it just flat out doesn’t. Against an unmovable force like Kobe the latter usually prevails.

A small spoiler, this may be for the fact that out of all the Big Three he is still the smallest. Out of KG, Pierce, and Allen, Ray Ray is probably called on the least and faces the least pressure or burden during losses. Nonetheless, I think we can all say we are glad that Mr. Clean showed up for these games because all the other performances have been spotty. Though, if you really think about it, it may just be for the fact that he has been going all Ubuntu on us and we are just now realizing that we still have the second greatest all time shooter in NBA History in our hands.

Pau “Angry Owl” Gasol is someone else who I thought also did a good job tonight. Even though he supposedly struggled and the numbers back that up, I liked what he did and what I saw from him tonight so much more than the previous two games. He came out with a fire in his belly and got slapped in the face, illegal screened, over the backed, and just kept on chugging. Though he was schmucking along offensively like everyone else on the floor not named after Japanese Beef, but he came up with some crucial buckets instead of allowing them which is great to see.

I am definitely not saying that he is coming anywhere close to matching the intensity that any of the Celtic bigs bring to the table, but he played better today. He got beat to the ball early, but I think in the second half showed a turnaround if just in the slightest degree (and I’m not just talking about the garbage putback he was gifted at the end).

In other news, the man still does not know how to close his mouth and for the most part looks like a dope whenever the cameras are on him (though its a nice contrast with the intensity of KG and the stoogiousity of PG).

Of course ultimately, I think everyone watching the game knew that it came down to Kobe Bean Bryant. He played very well within the offense and did all the things he was “supposed” to do, trusted his teammates, etc., etc., etc. Thankfully, he was on today so everything worked out pretty well, but even when he isn’t, Sasha Vujacic, for as much as I reneged on my criticism of him last game, should be the very last person to dribble up and take a contested pull up in the waning minutes of a game. (not too surprisingly, he has taken these kind of shots in the last couple games, which is pretty questionable…)

Another thing I was thinking about was how good a job the Celtics do of making the Lakers a jump shooting team. If you think about it, its not that difficult to see that how much this Lakers team has struggled. When it comes down to it, they aren’t that great of a jump shooting team. Even though, at least for me, I typically thought of them as such, they really have one great shooter, one maybe two good shooters (confidence and competency are often confused), and a lot of really mediocre shooters who exhibit a high tendency to such a confusion.

This really speaks volumes to how well the Celtics have packed the paint and got out to defend the perimeter only when necessary. On the other side of the equation, the Celtics are a very solid jump shooting teams with two great shooters, many very good spot up three point shooters, and one, possibly two of the best mid range shooters to ever play the game. Yet with all this, its my impression that they are doing a much better job getting into the paint and scoring on easy baskets.

Game 3 is the Lakers, hopefully KB and the gang snap out of it…

-E

Before I dive into post Game thoughts and what not, I just saw something on odenized of a clip that I had not seen during the coverage of tonights game. I probably missed it, but it really is interesting.

Quick synopsis of the video. Basically, Tim Donaghy, under pressure of hard time has, come out with allegations against the league. He is alleging that the NBA instructed its officials to officiate the game in a way favorable to a certain team or a certain outcome.

One such instance in which Donaghy pointed out was the Lakers-Kings series in 2002. This is particularly interesting to me because this series really represents probably one of my earliest basketball memories. I’m sure everyone in California remembers this series and how Horry hit the game winner on the miraculous tip out from Divac in Game 6 when it really looked like the Lakers were done. What a lot of people probably may not remember, I certainly forgot about it until it was brought up in the video, is that the Lakers were down big going into the Fourth quarter. That next quarter would go on to be what many still argue is the most poorly officiated playoff quarter in NBA history.

Certainly, I would argue and many others would to, the Lakers would not be in the position they were in at the end of the game, a position in which they had a chance to win in it, without some favorable officiating. Likewise, as JVG and Stern said, it is hard to find any credibility in a guy whose got his balls nailed to the proverbial wall.

Anyways, its pretty interesting. Take from it what you will.

Edit. More developments, even Ralph Nader wrote a letter to David Stern calling out the manipulation of that game.

-E

Well, seeing as how I am now a fully naturalized citizen (sworn in on a picture of Will Leitch) of the blogging community I have been descending deeper and deeper into the bowels of the blogging monster that is out there on the world wide web. A couple of my favorites are in the links section, but that no where near resembles the amount of solid, in depth, well thought out, well written, and most of the time hilarious blogs that there are out there.

One favorite target of opportunity that has been out there marinating in the blogging stratosphere is the whole Paul Pierce incident. Granted I already put in my two cents about the injury in a previous post, but I came across a little snippet on an AOL sports page that just got me thinking. And on a night of a summer in which I’m steadily progressing into the 14th year in my NBA 2k8 dynasty, I thought there was probably something better for me to do be doing.

Heres the quote: “Once I heard the knee pop and I couldn’t move it at first, I thought that was it,” Pierce said.

That’s when Rivers gathered the Celtics in a huddle during a timeout and reminded them of Nelson Mandela and South African struggles with apartheid, something the team has studied to inspire and motivate during this season.

‘I reminded them of ‘Cheetah’, the guy from South Africa who told us there will be adversity and you have got to overcome it,” Rivers said. “I was really proud of our team. We could have easily felt sorry for ourselves.’”

Yeah, thats right. Doc Rivers inspired his guys by comparing the struggle they faced with Paul Pierce out of the game to South African struggles during apartheid. Now I don’t have a degree in African American studies nor was I alive during the 60s, but I have read Cry, the Beloved Country and I think these two “struggles” are slightly different.

When did basketball player, athletes, and sports media personalities in general get such an inflated idea of sports and its importance or do they just draw these ridiculous contextual comparisons for lack of better material?

I can understand watching 300 with your players to get them pumped up even throwing in some inspirational words from some great leaders, but apartheid and the civil rights movement, really?…

A couple of months ago before the NCAA Finals, John Calipari printed out copies of Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech and handed it out to players. The Reverend Al Sharpton was even there to meet them after practice. I can almost excuse this because he is a college coach and part of what a college coach is supposed to do is to be a something of a teacher to his players, seeing as how they are “student athletes”. Its really too bad that this had to be done all too coincidentally before the biggest games of their young lives.

It gets even more amusing when these sports figures refer to some higher power tuning into watch these Finals Games and whats more suggesting that they are taking a little time away from minding the universe to intervene in a basketball game. Now usually I am okay with the occasional point to the heavens by athletes as they trot into the endzone or throw it down on someone’s head, but this quote by Paul Pierce is skirting the border between acceptable and absurd.

“I think God sent an angel down and said, ‘Hey you’re going to be all right. You need to get back out there’,” Pierce said.”

I hadn’t read the recap from Game 1 so perhaps this is already stale in the pile of still relevant topics. People say this hearkens memories of Willis Reed, from this quote I am willing to concede that it does in fact hearken some memories. Except for me this is what this event ultimately reminded me of. Thats right, remember that one scene where the boy looks over and sees the Angel massaging that one player who was injured and that player ends up going out and playing the game of his life.

I just never really pictured Danny Glover playing Doc Rivers.

Anyways, as much as I love sports, people in sports need to get over themselves. In the end this is just another brand of entertainment. Sure there are those moments that “transcend” the sport, but stop looking for them. I love one of those moments when an entire stadium of 20,000+ people rise to their feet and gets behind their team in a moment of adversity as much as the next guy, but lets not make it more than it really is. Lets not force some kind of greater importance to the struggle of competition within a game or attempt to reach for an overarching social significance in a greater societal context.

This is a game between two teams of athletes who, lets be honest, in the end, whether they win or lose, will still make and waste more money than any of us will ever probably even see through the length of our lives.

Sports are awesome enough with all this manufactured sap.

Finals so far haven’t been that great, but I might just be getting cynical. Here’s hoping for a rocking Staples Center and a great Game 2.

-E

That was pretty close. It might not be as easy as everyone said it would be for the Lakers. More after the jump…

To start off, I want to concede or change my mind about a couple points.

First of all, I really have to hand it to the Celtics defense. Before this series I really thought that there was no way a Celtics team who played against inferior talent all year could keep up with this Lakers’ explosive offense. However through this whole game I got proved wrong. In the first half, everytime the Lakers tried to set up their offense it was Garnett pressuring Gasol in the post making life difficult for Gasol (more on the schmuck of the night late). When ever the Lakers started to get a little roll offensively, its was the Celtics defense as a team who made them uncomfortable and forced them to take bad shots. I don’t think it was a coincidence as well that once the Celtics got complacent (I prefer lazy) defensively Kobe went off. Its clear that Kobe is being bothered by this kind of defense which is actually startlingly similar to the way the Spurs defended, except for the fact that the Spurs are about 84 years older than the Celtics.

I am willing to give the Celtics defense some credit.

Also, something else that I have been hesitant about is Sasha Vujacic. The Machine was someone who I traditionally thought of as one of those guys who looks a lot better than he actually is. (Kinda like those chicks who look great from some angles…) However, he showed me something tonight. When the rest of the Lakers were moping around the floor, he and Kobe were the only ones who had no idea what the score was. Typically, I gave Vujacic a hard time because he seemed to have an elevated conception of himself and his role on the team. Yet, it was exactly this type of player that the Lakers need in this game. In the end, what came out of such an attitude was hustle and competitiveness when it actually matters.

Nonetheless, The Machine was nowhere near as influential to what transpired in Boston tonight as the league MVP was. Criticize him all you want about the number of shots he took and about the trouble he was having with the Celtic defense, Kobe was the only one who got dressed to play 48 minutes of basketball. When the Lakers got steamrolled coming out of half time, it was a couple timely baskets and Kobe making it look easy that calmed down the rest of the Lakers. After the Celtics responded to this run by just releasing the floodgates offensively, it was Kobe again who never believed the scoreboard and it was the Celtics on the side of the court who looked way too much at the scoreboard. Whenever the Lakers made a little run, we can look at Kobe asserting himself on both sides of the ball that rallied them. I thought he could have done more, but the Celtics were rolling tonight with a rocking Boston crowd behind them.

In the end, the Lakers as a whole and Gummy Bear Gasol specifically are going to have to play better. I have yet to see his stats, but Gasol’s performance tonight was a joke. It was like after he dunked on Gasol, he said to himself, “Well, I got my revenge. I think I’m good for the night.” But he wasn’t good for the night, not anywhere close. Just as Kobe led the Lakers offensively in that it was his grit and determination in getting to the hole that rallied and calmed the Lakers offensively. It was the sloth like performance by Gasol in transition, in the paint, and on the glass that paved the way defensively for the indolent laziness of the rest of the team. (main culprits: Lamar Odom, Radmanovic, Luke Walton, and even a little bit of Ronni Turiaf even though usually he’s all about the hustle)

I could write a whole other section on Odom, but it would go on in much the same way and I would probably have to pull out a thesaurus to find more synonyms for lazy.

Anyways, I said from the beginning that the only way Boston could make this a seven game series would be if they took both at home, so in my eyes this was must win for them. I’m still calling for Lakers to win, though 6 looks like a bit of a stretch.

Game 3: 112-101 Lakers

-E

Edit. Pau Gasol’s stats for the night were decent, but it doesn’t tell the whole story. His lack of fire and heart meant he was always behind on the defensive end, getting him lost on defense, forcing fouls on the other Lakers. This loss is STILL on him.

Edit 2. Officiating was terrible, not the worst I have ever seen, but it this was definitely a hall of lame performance by the black and white. The did not consistently call any of the off ball fouls, part of the reason the foul discrepancy was so high. And then it was like they tried to make up for it by letting a crucial travel go in the final moments. Had the Lakers won it, Radmanovic’s travel on the dunk late in the game when every point was monumental would have been complained about by every Boston sports media outlet in the city.