damn these public access computers & their 15 minutes for the price of a cup of coffee!! at one time, it had been my intention to pick 'em up the nba playoffs through the finals. hand to god, i figgered golden state would give dallas a handful (though i had them bowing out in 6..). & since i pick my spurs to win every year... i would have looked like a visionary. instead, i got gun-shy after the nhl playoffs went all crazy & the only two teams i had specifically said wouldn't make it past the second round met for the cup. but that's another story. THIS is a reflection on the season that was. unlike my senators & saints & chargers. who all had good seasons, but fell short in the end. which is why my beloved spurs stand as the greatest sports team on the planet right now. bar none.
there, i said it...
1. & suddenly, out of nowhere, the nba has become more euro than the nhl. how the fuck did THAT happen? for the first time ever, a north american sports league has both a regular season mvp AND playoff mvp born in europe. and that league ISN'T the nhl...
2. what gives with this mvp nonsense, by the way? nowitzki put up his worst numbers since the 03-04 season while nash put up the best numbers of his career... and neither of them would have been given consideration if people didn't hate kobe bryant so much. robbed of the honours for a second consecutive year, kobe bryant put up sick numbers on a terrible team [NINE 50-point games? including 5-in-a-row, which may eclipse last-year's 81 points as my newest kobe OHMIGAWD stat. jordan himself never had either of those...] & got no consideration. it's a crime... it's a crime... & next year, lebron will start raking in mvp awards as he & sidney crosby begin a career-long battle to see who retires with more. man, that's gonna be fun to watch.
3. & while i have nothing but love for tony parker, the rightful playoffs mvp was lebron james. the cavs made the finals with a team that wouldn't have been in the playoffs without their leader. & with james leading the charge, mike brown & the rest of them just tried to keep up as lbj rewrote the books on sports in cleveland. the cavs lost games 1-2 to the pistons because james tried to get his team-mates involved from the start. in game 3, he corrected that oversight & went on to produce on of the greatest individual series efforts in living memory. interesting side note: to date there has only been one losing nba playoffs mvp... jerry west, who won the inaugural award in 1969 as his lakers fell to the celtics.
4. robert horry. it's becoming a cliche to talk about how clutch horry is as he collects championship rings. but he's just become the first player in nba history to win seven rings without winning at least one with the celtics. two with the hakeen/drexler rockets, three with the kobe/shaq lakers & now two with the spurs. DAMN, i love me some robert horry!
5. which brings me to an interesting question... why do people hate tim duncan so much? i watched game three of the finals in a bar with 8-9 people who spent the entire game venting about how much they hated him for not being "flashy". for being "boring"... granted, these were vancouver sports fans, but still... it made watching him pick the cavs apart all the sweeter. it's a sad statement about the mind-set of vancouver sports fans that they turn the same resentment of fundamental soundness on markus naslund whenever possible... & probably explains why the canucks have never won a cup & the grizzlies are still a terrible team all these years later.
6. speaking of which... it behooves me to gloat ever so slightly about the raptors. the first nba divisional title held by a canadian franchise. & the only first-round-losing team in the east not to get swept. take THAT, defending champion heat!! & the future looks glaring bright for the raptors... only three players on their roster had 5-or-more years of nba experience, with 5 europeans to tap into this new euro-league (oh, & i've just noticed that they picked up argentine carlos delfino from my pistons). coach of the year sam mitchell. best gm in the league. & a legitimate all-star around which to build the franchise.
7. my new favourite player... gilbert arenas. now... see... until this year i didn't pay the slightest never-mind to the golden state warriors & lost interest in the washington franchise back when mj bought it so he could play at being mario lemieux. but THIS season... i watched in awe as he sank game-winning shots one after another. but the moment came when he hit a mid-court game-winning buzzer-beater & was strolling off the court with his arms in the air before the ball went in. he went on to pull that stunt at least three more times before his season-ending injury put an end to dreams of playoff success in washington. keep an eye on these guys next year. interesting side note: yes, there WAS a time when there was nba playoff success in washington. b/w 1975-79, the bullets (newly arrived from baltimore) made the finals three times, losing to golden state in '75 & winning the first of back-to-back meetings with seattle in 1978. are you ready for the REAL interesting side-note? last year's finals b/w miami & dallas is the first in the 28 years since the 1979 seattle supersonics win over the washington bullets NOT to feature at least one of: pistons/spurs/lakers/bulls/rockets/celtics. & 10 of those featured TWO of those teams. ok... it's interesting to ME...
8. san antonio. the only other team in the nba (besides nash's suns & dirk's mavs) to have a winning percentage over .700. AND, for those of you who question my earlier assertion that they are the greatest team on the planet... they just became the only pro sports team anywhere to have won four championships in the past 10 years. yankees? 3. patriots? 3. lakers? 3. red wings? 3.
9. which brings me to my annual "what-did-they-DO" rant about steve nash & dirk nowitzki. only three sports-writers didn't give one of them the first-place mvp vote. & then dallas is out first round & phoenix is out second round. not even to the conference championships. at least last year, nowitzki made me look stupid until they ran into miami. & even into the first two games of the finals, before dwayne wade took destiny in hand & swept the heat to the title. it was exactly like the detroit-cleveland series this year, only wade's timing was better. but living in vancouver as i do... i have to spend a lot of time listening to talk of how great steve f%&$ing nash is. & every year, he joins the canucks on the sidelines long before the dance is over. prove me wrong next year, boys... i'm saying here & now that you won't.
10. & once again, as i've done every year since 2004-05, i'm picking a detroit/san antonio finals next year.