A Game 3 Reaction

There have been three great games of basketball played in the NBA Finals. The best part? No one has any idea what's going to happen in game four, let alone games four through seven.

We live in the age of hyperbole and overreaction. It's the only way to get ratings. When Oklahoma City came back in game one, it was because the Thunder were truly the better team, and were going to win this championship without a doubt. Nevermind the fact that Miami dominated early and got lazy offensively late. After game two, the narrative focused on OKC's inability to start quickly and Russell Westbrook's responsibility for everything bad that has ever happened to pro basketball in Oklahoma. Nevermind the fact that Miami dominated game two from the tip until about three minutes left, and OKC was within a foul call of forcing Miami to hit a game-winner.

So what's the takeaway from game 3? Hopefully nothing, because both teams gave a good effort throughout, even if the finish wasn't pretty. The Thunder stuck with Miami in the first quarter, and everybody looked correct in saying that was all they needed to do when OKC took a big lead in the third quarter...until the Heat came back and took the lead. Kevin Durant finally came back to earth in the fourth quarter, and James was probably a bit better than him. The heat played its worst quarter with turnovers in the fourth, but the Thunder didn't hit the shots to reclaim the lead.

You know what? Sometimes OKC just isn't going to hit everything in the fourth. Sometimes Durant is going to struggle, just like every other player in the history of every sport ever.

What's going to happen for the rest of this series? Nobody knows. Don't listen to Michael Wilbon saying the Thunder appear to be unraveling. that Don't listen to Stephen A. Smith when he says Scott Brooks blew it by not having "Serge Ibaka, the NBA's leading shot blocka, one of the most dominant rim-protectas we've seen in years," in the game at the end. Don't listen to Skip Bayless when he says whatever he says (that goes for all days, not just following game three of the NBA Finals). It was one game. Both teams were good in the fourth on defense, but neither team was good in the fourth on offense. The NBA is the only league in which great offense seems to beat great defense out. Game four will be different in every way.

So what's on the docket for game four? Hopefully something close and entertaining like game three.

Who will win the NBA Finals?

Through perhaps more twists and turns than expected, we got the NBA Finals most of us were expecting (and looking forward to). So which team is going to win?

Based on the conference Finals, the answer looks like the Thunder, without much issue. In games three through six against San Antonio, OKC asserted itself as the dominant team. In game three, the Spurs gave up early, conserving their energy for a more winnable contest. In games four, five and six though, OKC got San Antonio's best. Even with a fabulous first quarter in the decisive game, the Spurs couldn't hold off a more talented and physically superior Thunder team. And the crazy thing was, it felt a bit inevitable.

On the other hand, Miami is a much better defensive team than San Antonio. And Kevin Durant's virtuoso fourth quarter in game four of the Western Conference Finals was only outdone by Lebron James's entire-game (okay, 3.5 quarters and then he came out) performance in Boston for game six. And with Chris Bosh back, the Heat look like a team that is going to elevate its game to another level this postseason.

Here's the thing about the Thunder: their offense isn't very good. It consists entirely of jump-shooting, and often times those jump-shots come off all individual plays by Durant, Russell Westbrook or James Harden (although the Thunder showcased a much greater penchant for sharing the ball in the final two games of the West Finals). Typically, one of those guys is struggling a bit. But that doesn't matter much. When two of them are shooting well, the Thunder are extremely difficult to beat, because that jump-shooting, individually based offense works (works out). So an opponents best shot at defeating OKC comes when two players are having an off night. This is something that is guaranteed to happen sometimes. But four out of seven games? Not likely. And even if you do get four off games from two players, its not exactly a guaranteed win (see: game 4, Western Conference Finals).

Here's the thing about the Heat: if there is a team equipped to effectively defend the Thunder, it's them. Lebron James is the perfect body size and has enough quickness to guard Kevin Durant when it matters most. Dwyane Wade is just enough of a slimeball (and still has that quickness and athleticism) to veteranly (just now made that up) piss Westbrook off. Put Shane Battier on Harden, and you've got to be feeling pretty good about your ability to at least force the Thunder into more difficult shots at the end of a game (which granted, will all go in some games). Combine that with Chris Bosh pulling Serge Ibaka away from the basket more than anyone in San Antonio did, and the offensive end is opened up a bit more.

The problem with all this, of course, is that even a 45, 15 and 5 from Lebron will not be enough to put the Thunder away. When that happened in game six in Boston, the Celtics didn't know how to respond. They stuck around for as long as they could, but it quickly became clear that Lebron wasn't slowing down, no matter what they did to try and stop him. The Thunder may not be able to stop him if he goes off, but they will have the appropriate response: they won't care. Tony Parker scored 21 points in the first quarter against OKC in game 6, and the Thunder just shrugged it off. They kept playing, started scoring at a better clip, and eventually overwhelmed the Spurs. Miami isn't as likely to slow down as the Spurs were, but there was no team withstanding the onslaught the Thunder performance in the second half of game six.

Perhaps due to their youth, the Thunder just don't really know when to give up. Whereas many teams in the NBA (and other sports) decide to throw in the towel when they are getting stomped in order to conserve energy for the next game, the Thunder just don't have that mentality. And due to their prodigious talent level, it often ends up with them coming back and at least making the game close, even if it's not a win. In that way, they are very much the Rafael Nadal of basketball. (I was going to link to one shot in that video, but 95% of them represent the point I was trying to communicate. Rafa running himself ragged to chase down a ball that every other player I can think of would have given up on).

So unless Dwyane Wade gets himself going and plays much better than in the Boston series, I don't think Miami has the firepower to deal with OKC's combination of firepower and extreme amounts of will. That, plus the Thunder haven't lost at home yet, and they have the home court advantage.

Miami goes down to the team that wants it way more again, 4-2.

End Times in Miami?

So it's been quite a while since my last post and my excuse is that I've been very busy. In the past month I've moved from Ohio to Colorado and started a new job with the Craig Daily Press. For all my Eastern Time Zone readers, that means the posts are going to be coming across the horn later at night. Apologies for that. But with internet newly installed in my apartment, I'm ready to get back to doing some serious posting. It just so happens that I'm coming back during a particularly interesting time in sports.

There will be tennis posts to come. The Euro Soccer Championships will be thrilling, but they can wait. The New York Mets are enjoying success I could not have imagined at this point in the year, but it's still early in baseball. There has been an inordinate amount of news coming out of the Atlantic 10 this summer, and we'll get there soon enough. But I'm somewhat ashamed to admit that my interests match up with those of ESPN; that is to say, I want to talk about the Miami Heat.

If you have an excellent memory, you'll recall that I wrote about the Heat in one of my most recent posts. I talked about not being worried about the Heat, because they're just too talented to lose to most of the teams in the NBA when the games really matter. I continued to feel that way when the Indiana Pacers took a 2-1 lead on the Heat, and Miami won the next three games. I still didn't worry when the Celtics came back to tie the Eastern Conference Finals 2-2. Even Bosh-less, the Heat have way more talent than Boston. But now, there is nothing but worry for the Heat, because they are a game down and have to win in Boston to stay alive. Not impossible, but not feeling likely right now.

So how did this happen? How did Miami go from overwhelming favorite to the brink? Was it because we (I) overestimated them? I don't think so. They are the same team as last year (probably a bit better), the loss of Bosh notwithstanding. While I've battled the "inability to close" idea that ESPN and others have propagated since last season, it keeps coming true. But I think the term "close" is the wrong one. No one can close a game better than the Miami Heat when they have an eight point lead. They play loose and are unstoppable on offense, like normal. As a result, teams can't get any closer down the stretch.

But when Miami is in a two or three-point game, or losing by a few, the offense just doesn't seem to flow as freely. Dwyane Wade and Lebron James' drives to the basket don't even seem as smooth. They play a forced, rough style of basketball. During a normal part of any game, the layups are beautiful, inventive and always seem to drop. At the end of a close one, though, something is missing (couldn't find a video of Garnett blocking James down the stretch of game 5, but that's a good example. Just a basic, straight-line drive to the basket. That's not going to work in the NBA most times.) And it's not just better defense.

This is very interesting, because Wade and James have proven many times in the past that they are capable. Lebron James is the same guy that went for 47 against the eventual champion Boston Celtics in game 7, and single-handedly beat the Detroit Pistons in two overtimes in 2007. But in years past, he hasn't been there. He is still as dominant as ever, but isn't dominating at the right time, or at least not dominating enough to make that "right time" not matter.

Will that come back? Game 6 in Boston would be a good place to start.

NBA Conference Finals

Two games have passed in the NBA Eastern Conference Finals and, as is always the case with the NBA, there are some things from those games worth paying attention to and others that aren't. So what have we learned so far?

In the Eastern Conference Finals between the Chicago Bulls and Miami Heat, the two games have been extremely different in the second halves. The first halves in each game were almost identical scorewise (tied at 48 in game one, 48-46 Miami in game two). The difference in game one was a dominant Bulls second half, in which they held Miami to just 34 points. The Bulls offensive output in the second half of game two? 29 points. Clearly defense has been the key in the first two games of the series. But I'm not convinced it's just defense that's making that difference.

In game one, Derrick Rose went 10-22 from the field and scored 28 points, Luol Deng added 21 on 7-15 shooting, and Taj Gibson came of the bench to be the spark plug, scoring nine points and grabbing seven boards, with some emphatic dunks to boot. On the other side, only Chris Bosh had a good game for Miami. His 30 points were big, but Lebron James and Dwyane Wade only combined for 33 points (15 and 18, respectively). I think it's safe to say Miami is going to struggle if those two put up anemic offensive numbers like that.

Flash forward to game two. In a Miami win, James and Wade went for a combined 53 points and 19 rebounds. Udonis Haslem came off the bench and provided 13 big points and 5 rebounds, along with some emphatic dunks. For the Bulls, things didn't go so well. Rose scored 23 points, but on 7-23 shooting. Deng had only 13 after scoring nine in the first quarter, and Gibson wasn't so big off the bench, with eight points and one board. Sound familiar?

Basically, the script was flipped between games. I don't think Chicago's defense changed much, James and Wade just made more shots in game two. Miami's defense did change a bit, with their two stars manning up on Rose more often, but it's not likely that will result in a 7-23 performance every night. He's just too good for something like that. Who knows if Haslem and Gibson will be big off the bench ever again in this series as well.

So what have we learned through two games of the Eastern Conference Finals? Damn, not as much as we thought. Chicago was extremely impressive in game one's second half, and then Lebron was extremely impressive in game two's fourth quarter. Hopefully we'll be treated to a game three in which both teams play well: Rose going for 25-plus, and three of Chicago's role players going for 15 or more, while James and Wade complete another 50-plus point performance, while both team's benches contribute, but Chicago's bench is a bit better. I think coming into the series that is what a prototype game would have looked like, and until we see one, it's going to be hard to say what'll happen from here on out.