NFL, NBA Preview, and the World Series
Have a good read and you will see I mention that for the NFL I had New Orleans Saint as the best team and Indianapolis Colts are up there, sure I looked for value and my other teams disappointed unless you backed them and then traded them to a profit.
The same article had the NY Yankees beating the Philadelphia Phillies in five.. before the MLB season I tipped this very World Series though it wasn't hard as NY Yankees finally got pitching and Philadelphia Phillies as I suggested didn't getting worse, Yankees ended up winning in six.
More importantly at the beginning of this NBA season I suggested in the article that the Boston Celtics beat the LA Lakers in finals 4-2. I will admit that there is an article in between which made me feel that the value was in Cleveland and Utah Jazz, but that's based on market price, rather than say who I suggested straight out felt, and who I would feel that would win. Admitadly Boston were looking worn a little and old, and Kobe's finger and Andrew Bynum's back was a major concern.
My biggest concern in this series for the Boston Celtics is rebounding. Especially on their defensive end. If you break down game two of the Eastern Conference Finals, though they won it and for mine was the flat out better team. Even when they were trying, only leading by 4 points or less. There were stretches were Orlando were dominating the offensive boards. If you are to suggest that's going to happen with Superman in the middle, that's fine. But LA Lakers have three big men as big as Dwight Howard, sure they are not as powerful and defensively dominate as he is. But it really concerns me as an original Celtics tipster.
The Celtics have beaten the two teams with the best record in the NBA. Though I didn't feel it was a surprise against the Orlando Magic, where I personally took plenty of the $3.00 on the Celtics to win the series (they were even $1.93 or pick'em after they won game one in Orlando). I was somewhat surprised how they beat the Cleveland Cavs as easily as they did. There is no doubt in my mind that there were serious issues with LeBron's elbow.
The Boston Celtics have made it to the NBA Final Series through tough defense, defense defense. Throughout the playoffs, up until the Orlando's win in Game Four of the eastern Conference final, the Celtics opponents were averaging 18 turnovers per game. Celtics in the last three games had 15 to Orlandos 19 and lost at home, 10-13 and lost and 13-12 and won. They have also kept their opposition to 40% shooting during this period.
My advice, if you break down a game, and say watch it for the second time. Is to just watch defense, and don't watch the amazing dunks and shots. Watch who is guarding who, watch where people are standing when Kobe makes his shots, why isn't someone in his face? If there is someone in his face, fine Kobe is a great player, and they are getting beaten by a great player/shot! But if he is wide open or the defender is 2 foot away, why? Who isn't rotating properly? Where are the double teams coming from and why?
To this I am going to suggest that Paul Pierce will no doubt guard Kobe Bryant and use Tony Allen off the bench to help as well. I am not stupid enough to suggest that Pierce will stop Kobe, but I will suggest that he will atleast do a good job on Kobe as he did on LeBron. Kobe averaged 33.7 pts (52.1%), 7.2 rebounds and 8.30 assists against the Suns, of course he won't average this against the more defensive orientated Celtics. Some people suggest that the Lakers don't have a true point guard, with Kobe playing the way he does you honestly don't need one. Two years ago the Celtics "stopped" Kobe by making him average 25.7 pts (40%) ~ though the Lakers didn't have Andrew Bynum (injury) or Defensive orientated Trevor Ariza (broken foot) two years ago, the Celtics won Game 6 in LA 131-92 hmmmmm.
As I suggested, when watching the same game for second or third time I like to watch defensive match ups and rotations. But after watching the Suns "defense" in Game One and Two of the Western Conference Finals, I almost stopped watching the Suns doing a "good" job on the Lakers. Their defense this season has seriously improved so much, that they deserve to be in the Western Conference Finals. But, your going to say that the Lakers scored 128 in game one, they did! Which leads me to suggest that though I started to watch the Suns much improved attitude to defense, they could not stop LA Lakers passing. Especially inside the key. When Pau Gasol is passing like he was in game one, the team is unstoppable.
Now lets add Tex Winter's Three Post Play (you might know it as Phil Jackson's triangle offense) to Pau Gasol perfect passing, add how I mentioned that Boston Celtics were getting burned by Orlando's offensive rebounds and extra shots. It means you have three Lakers ready in position to burn the offensive boards, against a team which looked vulnerable in rebounding. And though you might be able to give Orlando Magic some extra shots and win, you can't do that against the LA Lakers.Just ask the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game six, Kobe missed what should have been the final shot, but who was in position to get the offensive board and the game winning putback? The second post player, Pau Gasol. That single and defining play might be a microcosm of the entire series. Hopefully Doc Rivers will sort something out and KG just won't allow it. Just to illustrate my point again, it happened in Game five of the Western Conference final, Kobe missed again, and though I actually feel that the Phoenix Suns played that shot perfectly against Kobe, Ron Artest was just a little bit quicker to react to Kobe's Airball then Jason Richardson and the Lakers get their second last gasp win. If Kobe hit the rim, or pretty much anything other than that airball the game goes into overtime. Sadly for the Suns they boxed out the big men and got the stop on Kobe, but such is Basketball.
As for the Zone defense which worked effectively against the Lakers in Game 2,3,4 for the Suns. I feel that the Celtics may try it and may try for long periods of time. But Doc Rivers loves to play Man-on-Man, which was illustrated in not bringing a double team on Dwight Howard and leaving Perkins to Man up on him.
So I guess I want to give reason why to stay on the Celtics Bandwagon. Well it all starts with Brian Scalabrine (joking) of course it starts with Rajon Rondo. One of the best point guards battles I have seen is when the Chicago Bulls' Derrick Rose took the Celtics to seven Games last year. Most figured that it was the Big three which got the Celtics home, but Rondo really showed what he was about, and Derrick Rose was amazing.
This playoffs Rajon Rondo has added the drive and kick out. Scoring more, taking it to the hoop more, and generally making better decisions. His passes have been near perfect, and really made look LeBron James Cavs look ordinary. So much will come down to how he plays. Looking at the Western Conference Finals series, the LA Lakers struggled defensively when Steve Nash for the Phoenix Suns, drove and kicked out or shot himself. So if Rondo plays like he did against the Cavs, in Game 1,2,3 and 6 vs the Magic, Boston can really take the big men out of the series and win the Championship. He was very tentative in the 4th qtr of Game 4 and the overtime, as well as Game five (injured???) but stepped up in Game six, even taking some hard fouls and playing on. Nate Robinson had a great little period in game six, but I would not be relying on this or Marquis Daniels return for the Celtics to win the Championship.
These teams have played twice this season, with the road team winning each time. Boston can win because they are the first NBA Finalist with a better record on the road (26-15) than at home (24-17) in the regular season, they are also 6-3 away from home this postseason.
Now in the Cavs series the Cavs had the best player on the court in LeBron James, let's not debate that. But it was the Celtics who had the next best 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th (Perkins or Davis), then back to Cavs for 8th (Mo Williams) back to 9th in Tony Allen.
In this series I am going to go Kobe, then Rondo, Pau Gasol, Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, Ray Allen, Lamar Odom, Kendrick Perkins, Glen 'Baby' Davis and then suggest all the rest are tier three players, that is average mid range players including Derek Fisher and Rashard Wallace. Suggesting that LA Lakers have the big superstar in Kobe, Boston has the Big 4 (including Rondo) and the LA Lakers have the three talls... it's a pretty even matchup. No clear cut advantage.
Did you know...
The Celtics and the Lakers have combined to win 32 of the 62 NBA Championships, they have met 12 times in the Finals, the last one two years ago which Boston won.
Okay here's my theory on why Phil Jackson has been told to take a pay cut. Remember Phil Jackson has won ten rings, the LA Lakers could not win a Championship in recent times without him. Dr Jerry Buss isn't exactly strapped for money, nor should the Francisce be considering the superstars in the front row, every 4"9" asian in Australia has a Kobe shirt (and Man United) and they are in the finals. So why then? Why slap this Lakers icon in the face? Because Kobe Bryants ego is once again coming to light. He has won a title with Shaq, then had to prove to the world he can win without him so got rid of Shaq. Now everyone is saying that Kobe can't with with Phil Jackson, and Kobe's ego wants to be better than Michael Jordan, so I am tipping that he has spoken to management and said it's me or Phil. Though Phil might be married to Jerry's daughter I think people will still come and watch the Lakers without Phil, rather than not having Kobe to look at.
Well if you are still reading or just skipped down to the bottom of the page, Remember the series is 2-3-2 meaning two in LA, then three in Boston and two in LA.
Boston jumps out and wins game one in LA, currently +5.5 outsiders or $2.97 to win. Don't forget Phil Jackson is something like 47-0 when winning game one. Then Lakers win Game two...
Now here I am not sure about and want to say that Boston win all three at home, but really it would not surprise me if Lakers take one here, so the series goes back to Los Angeles.... So I'm going to skip ahead here and say Boston Celtics win in game six in LA!!!
I told you 26th of October last year and well things haven't changed :))
