NBAtastic

I forgot to post my NBA Playoff picks. Of course, now game 1 is in
the books, and all my predictions feel a little silly, but I assure
you, these are what they were prior to last weekend's games:

The East

Cavs demolish the Pistons 4-0
Pistons are dead, long live the King. If there is a just and noble
Basketball God, then the Cavs will win it all this year. As a team,
they are way, WAY more than the sum of their parts. They play as well
together as any team I've ever seen.

Bulls over Celtics, 4-2
Think back to what you thought of the Celtics when they traded that
draft pick for Ray Allen two years ago (before they got Garnett). Did
you even think that was a playoff team? Me neither. That's the team
they have now, minus Al Jefferson.

Magic over 76ers, 4-1
76ers were good in the playoffs last year, but not that good.
Although the Magic have a bevy of ridiculous flaws, they do have a lot
of raw talent and I like their coach (despite what Shaq says).

Miami over Heat, 4-2
The most effective basketball player alive in the postseason is
Dwayne Wade, bar none. I can't imagine he doesn't continue to will
this team to overachieve [ed. I feel a little silly about this after
that game 1].

The West

Lakers over Utah, 4-0
Utah is too emotional, and Boozer's monumental bad karma will
prevent them from ever getting it together in this series.

Nuggets over Hornets, 4-0
Chris Paul is a lot better than Chauncy Billups, but Billups isn't
that bad. There's nobody on the Hornets I believe in after Paul.
This should be easy.

Mavs over Spurs, 4-2
The only way this is even close is if the refs gift the Spurs a few
games. The Mavs, the way they've played at the end of the season, are
the second best team in the West, and the 3rd best team in the league.
Hardly anyone is talking about this, but Jason Kidd's defensive
liabilities are much much less when he's guarding 2s (and with Barea
and Terry, he doesn't have to guard 1s). I can't imagine anyone but
Portland and the Lakers really taking advantage of Kidd in the scheme
they've been running. This is a bad matchup for the Spurs. They
would have probably trounced the Hornets, Jazz, or Rockets, but I
can't see them beating the Mavs.

Rockets over Portland, 4-1
This is really unfortunate for Portland, because they match up
really well against every other team in the West. Yao is tough for
them, because their bigs are too short to stop him on D unless he's
making mistakes (and he doesn't actually make many mistakes), and they
can't force him into foul trouble on offense. Plus Portland's heart
and soul (Brandon Roy) will have the single best defensive player in
the league constantly giving him a headache (Battier). I would
actually say that Portland is the most likely team in the West to
knock off the Lakers, but I can't see them getting past the Rockets.

Overall, I think it would be silly to expect anything but a
Cavs-Lakers final, and I can't imagine the Lakers losing it. The
Lakers have some chinks in the armor, but I don't see a Western
conference team exploiting them. The Cavs might be able to, but I
just get the feeling that most teams _expect_ the Lakers to be
unbeatable. And that's 9/10ths of what it takes for them to actually
be unbeatable. Playoff Kobe is always better than
Selfish...uh...Regular Season Kobe, but he's been a lot worse this
year at everything than he ever has been. I think he's got this year
and next and then his window is closed. Finally.