NBA Playoffs 2012 Thread Round II

[ranger]

You would blame Tony Parker? Are you joking? He shot alot, sure, but other than that he had more rebounds, more points, less turnovers, and a lot more assists than Manu (who I also think played great) all while shooting close to 50% (the same percentage as Manu), so you can't blame him without blaming Manu as well. If I were to blame anyone, I'd blame the under-performing bench (especially Green and Splitter and aside from maybe Stephen Jackson) of the supposedly deepest team in the NBA. If they had stepped up like they should have, it could have been an entirely different game.

Also, I'm not sure about Popovich's decision to start Manu. I don't think that worked well at all.

It's a fact that Tony struggles a lot against physical frontcourt teams, as a 30 yr old PG who thrives off speed and inside scoring.  I'm not joking - stats aren't everything.  My source: 10 years of watching this team play in the postseason, so yes If I had to blame a player, it has to be Tony.  He's always been the weakest link IMO out of the big 3.

Also, no blame to Popovich.  His Manu start makes sense.  We needed more offensive power, especially with Thabo playing Tony Parker so well.  Also, Green went into a slump, like any shooter does.  

Yeah, there is blame for the 'others', like Green, Bonner, Tiago, etc.  Most of our roleplayers are shooters, and unfortunately, they lack playoff experience, and shooters hit slumps.  In general, these players have had career years so you can't really expect anymore from these nobodies-to-nba players.  Except screw Bonner, get rid of him ASAP, I've watched 4 years of this fool choke so hard.  GET OUT.

[M.Holmes]

You could tell Duncan was running out of steam, so considering his age and the fact that he's not used to playing that many minutes, he probably didn't have the confidence to take on Ibaka or Perkins at the basket.

Say what you will about TP, but he performed well tonight when the series was on the line while Manu's game left a lot to be desired.

Looking toward the finals, I would love to see the LeBron-Durant match-up. I prefer the Celtics as a team and originally predicted that they would best Miami, but I can't help but hope that LeBron makes it through to take on OKC in what would probably be one of the best final series of the century.

[ranger]

we already watched the finals series just now..OKC has won it all

[M.Holmes]

While I do agree with you, didn't you say something similar about the Spurs? Anything can happen in basketball, and while both the Celtics and the Heat aren't playing particularly good basketball at the moment, I still realize that anything is possible.

Just look at the playoffs as a whole so far: Bulls lost to the 76ers in the first round, no one saw that coming. The Celtics who nearly lost to the 76ers are now leading Miami 3-2. OKC winning 4 straight against what many considered the best team in the league who had won 20 straight games. So yeah, it can still definitely be a close match in the finals, even though I doubt it, especially if OKC keeps playing like this.

[ranger]

injuries, and Spurs OKC are far better teams than C's and Heat.

[Jd-]

Thunder have this in the bag. The Heat and Celtics aren't good enough teams to beat them in a series of 7.

While I'd also like to see LeBron and Durant square off, I don't think it's going to matter who it is that's in the finals because while I do love Durant and consider LeBron to be considerably better than him individually, Durant is on a far better team. We need Bosh and Spoelstra out of Miami, and if losing this series to the Celtics pushes us a bit closer to that, then that's what has to happen.

[Beastly]

Biggest game of the season(ratings-wise probably) tonight let's go Celtics I'm kinda scared about the refs though SMH... LeBron and Wade will probably gets millions of FTs tonight but hope refs call fairly ..

And JD what's wrong with Bosh it's not his fault he got injured... I say trade their Wing role players for a big or a PG role player... If they lost that's it.

UPDATE: DANNY "Fu--k-ng" Crawford will be the ref tonight wow... Stern making it not obvious.

UPDATE 2: Tom Washington who was 10 feet away when Wade fouled Rondo in Game 2 in OT... Good Job stern.

[Jd-]

Bosh's injury isn't the problem--it's the fact that he's taking up $16 million this season on the cap. The rest of the primary roster takes up only $19.7 million, when you take Mike Miller ($5.4 million), Chalmers ($4 million), Haslem ($3.7 million), Joel Anthony ($3.6 million), and Shane Battier ($3 million) into account.

To put it frankly: Bosh is not worth $16 million dollars. Bosh could be ditched for two $8 million dollar players to give the team some depth that could match his stats individually, or even for three quality players of varying amounts. The rest of the Heat roster simply isn't good enough for Bosh to make up for their shortcomings. I like Chris Bosh (despite the very untimely injuries) and I think he has a lot of redeeming qualities, but he's not aggressive enough in his position or at taking control of the court when they need him to. If they trade him away (he can't be released, of course--the cap penalty would be immense), they can make a team with LeBron and D-Wade at the forefront and have the Big 2 be the head of a team, instead of the Big 2 having no choice but to masquerade as the team as they're doing right now.

To put this into a bit of perspective: Rondo is only making $10 million this year, and he still has three more years of those numbers on his contract.

[ranger]

I think the issue might be Wade and Lebron still.  Bosh is still a borderline all-star big man, which is pretty hard to come by these days in a guard-dominated league.  I'm one of those guys that think Lebron and Wade are too similar, and might play a lot better if one of them was traded away

I'd maybe try and find some value from giving up Wade.  Maybe acquiring Nash for a last stint for a championship.  Otherwise, OKC is going to win like 5 championships the next 10 years with current standing rosters.

[Jd-]

Bosh is a great player... for about half of what he's getting paid. At $16 million, he's in the same ballpark as the absolute top players in the league, which--while he is good--he is not that good. Bosh is, I think, the 14th highest-paid player in the NBA. The only person who thinks he deserves that is Chris Bosh.

[M.Holmes]

Watching Spoelstra's pep talk in the locker room - he has the gravitas of a Teletubby.

[dilbertschalter]

we are witness, god damn. 41 already.

[M.Holmes]

No answer for James tonight. The game is already over, not sure why Spo is still playing James and Wade; good way to make the same mistake as Thibodeau.

[Jd-]

The MVP showing why he's the MVP. Good thing the Heat didn't need a second player tonight because the rest of them weren't doing too much.

[Beastly]

Game 7 bro can't get any better than this... First Game 7 of Heat's big 3 Let's go