Portland at LA Lakers --

One thing that might ultimately hold Portland back is its reliance on jump shots. They have enough guys who can make them, but so did the Flip-era Wolves.

Rudy Fernandez's shooting motion reminds me of Peja Stojakovic.

The Lamar Odom bench experiment could be the deciding factor in whether the Lakers win the title.

From last night...

Celtics:
- Seeing Paul Pierce tearing up while getting his ring was pretty awesome. I was touched, not gonna lie.
- Paul Pierce = 10 lbs lighter & even better than last year? He looked pretty efficient and amazing last night.
- Leon Powe - Continues to be vastly under rated & appreciated. A couple of sick dunks.
- Celtics crowd - Chanting WAL-LY WAL-LY to mock him as Powe posted his sorry a$$ up was one of the best chants I have heard in a long time.
- Rondo - I never get sick of the fake-behind-the-back-pass move, even if he only converts the layup that follows is > 50% of the time.
- KG - Just had to mention him since he's my man.

Cavs:
- Delonte West - I like the new look. Adds to his thug appeal.
- Wally - He is soooo bad now, it makes me laugh out loud while watching. Man he is a bad player.
- LeBron - Some nice dunks, but... I wonder how much he worked on his game in the offseason? I wonder if he has the true passion to win like Jordan/Kobe/KG/D. Wade have? I kind of feel like he doesnt - like he is too into too many other things.


Lakers:
- ARIZA = Stud. CW knows I have long had a man-crush on him.
- Odom as 6th man - I love it. A 6th man on a championship calibur team is honestly probably the PERFECT role for him.

Blazers:
- Oden....yikes. But it was his 1st game ever, so I really wasn't shocked. Much like Love and most other highly touted newbies, it will take longer than most people want to believe for him to become accustomed.
- OUTLAW = Stud. He is CW & I's Portland man-crush. Whenever we type a name in all caps it either means man-crush or legend.

The Jazz's play-by-play guy, describing a 20-10 from Carlos Boozer: "What a great night for booze." Is it funnier that it was for a Utah player?

From Memphis-Houston:
- Memphis was frisky from what I saw, but I don't think they're much, if any, better than the Wolves last year.
- Houston didn't look in sync offensively. And Ron Artest is still the most-uncoordinated good perimeter player in the NBA. One way or another, I don't know whether they can beat the Lakers.

Utah-Denver:
- Kenyon Martin is a terrible post-up player.
- The Nuggets are still a possible playoff team, but that would mean that another team slips (Dallas, Phoenix, Portland).

Golden State: playing w the intensity that let them upseat mavs a couple years back, but all they do is:
1. severely push tempo
2. take 3s
3. draw contact as they barrel through the lane


NO: looks surprised by GS's intensity and unable to get their shuff together. they need to ramp up a bit. started hot but slowed when cp sat. posey is def a nice add, and mike james aint a bad backup pg.


i keep thinking gs is going to hurt themselves by running into eachother or creating a traffic jam in the paint.

OUTLAW and ARIZA were studs last night. Major man crushes. Almost Gomes-like, but not quite.

Portland - I gotta believe Oden was just excited/nervous. He looked worse than Dikembe on offense. Outlaw is going to be good. I really like him and Webster. Rudy looked smooth with the rock. Portland is going to be good. Sucks for us.

Lakers - They look very, very good. Ariza is healthy and is underrated. He's good. Odom off the bench works well. Kukoc-esque. After two games it looks like Kobe is going to try to cruise when he can so that he's a bit more healthy. Just an idea. Bynum looked ok.

Phoenix - Shaq is on a mission to prove he can still have "it." He's not going to average 20 and 10, but he was all over the Spurs' bigs, including TD. IF they can keep him to maybe 25-30 minutes a game, they could still be a force. Nash is still Nash. Amare what he is - an offensive juggernaut, a defensive role player.

Spurs - Suck as usual. Duncan's trash. Parker's trash. Manu should retire.

What are these stupid Bobcats jerseys. I think they put the Knicks, Wizards and the HORRIBLE Piston's jersey's of the Grant Hill era in a blender.

College Wolf wrote:
OUTLAW and ARIZA were studs last night. Major man crushes. Almost Gomes-like, but not quite.

You kiss your mother with that mouth?

So my mailbag question from a month ago about who is the NEXT Gomes man crush.... Outlaw and Ariza. It seems like every announcer wants to give Ariza a HJ, but I've never really seen him play well.

Bobcats-Cavs:
- Didn't watch much of this one. Emeka Okafor looked stiff. Adam Morrison looked slow.
- The first two Cavs games, Anderson Varejao looked like one of the best players on the floor. Active on the boards, finishing near the basket.

Mavericks-Rockets:
- Based on the first two games, I think the Rockets will play as well or better against good teams as they do against not-so-good ones. If they lose some to the bottom third of the league, that would be the difference between a 4-5 seed or a 1-2 seed.
- Antoine Wright starts for the Mavericks. In a 3 minute stretch, he turned the ball over while throwing a behind-the-back pass, missed a layup, turned the ball over again, and fouled T-Mac on a three. This might be the guy to leave open on Saturday.
- Jason Kidd looked a little faster than he did last year.
- Ron Artest looked really good on O and D. He also picked up a warrantless T for trying to break up a situation under the basket.
- The Mavs did well when they were able to fast break, but Houston shut them down by getting back and forcing them to work for shots.
- Josh Howard was able to get to the basket consistently, partially because he's quick and also because his defender was getting run through screens.

Hornets-Suns:
- I think a lot of teams are going to guard Chris Paul with their 2 or 3 and force Mo Pete or Peja to beat them on post ups.
- Paul was still the best player on the floor.
- The Suns' halfcourt O is decent. They're making sure to involve Shaq.

pants wrote:
College Wolf wrote:
OUTLAW and ARIZA were studs last night. Major man crushes. Almost Gomes-like, but not quite.

You kiss your mother with that mouth?

So my mailbag question from a month ago about who is the NEXT Gomes man crush.... Outlaw and Ariza. It seems like every announcer wants to give Ariza a HJ, but I've never really seen him play well.


You should watch him play. He's actually pretty good. Oh, and he's a STUD.

Shaq is revitalized... I told ya'll haters when I drafted him in the TWB Yahoo fantasy league!!!

Artest got screwed on that technical. It was SOLELY because of his reputation. What a shame. I hope it gets overturned.

Morrison looked like a rookie out there. He is tall and has the shooting skills but he has an aura of being lost (read: Brewer last year). And the defense is a complete disaster. He makes Wally looks like a stopper.

There is no excuse for him being this clueless.

pants wrote:
Morrison looked like a rookie out there. He is tall and has the shooting skills but he has an aura of being lost (read: Brewer last year). And the defense is a complete disaster. He makes Wally looks like a stopper.

There is no excuse for him being this clueless.


Excuse: Because his hair gets in his eyes?

pants wrote:
What are these stupid Bobcats jerseys. I think they put the Knicks, Wizards and the HORRIBLE Piston's jersey's of the Grant Hill era in a blender.



This picture is funny. You can see RJ protecting the goods.

Golden State vs. Toronto:
First of all, great game. Really physical and hard-fought battle. Strange to see considering both teams are more uptempo teams. Both teams exposed the other's weakness: Toronto's lack of athleticism on the perimeter (except for Jamario Moon) and Golden State's lack of a lead guard and lack of interior D.

- Warriors played pretty much the entire second half with Stephen Jackson as the PG. It worked for a while because they were drawing fouls on post ups and getting offensive rebounds, but they took a lot of quick shots late in the game, even though they had the lead. They also shortened their bench in the second half, which led to two guys (Jackson and Turiaf) fouling out.

- Chris Bosh plays in the post the way I wish KG would've when he was here: drawing contact, rarely ever settling for jumpers. Jermaine O'Neal is still good on D but didn't show much O. They remind me a lot of the Flip-era Wolves: a finesse team without a lot of athletes beyond one freakish athlete (Bosh).