NBA Season Thread 2014-15 (draft pick, draft, playoffs, star)
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And I see the Hawks won in Portland last night! Maybe we should officially start to take them seriously??
Today: Cleveland loses again....this time to Dallas and they are now officially closer to OUT of the playoffs (6 games up on 9th place Indiana) than first place (6.5 back of the Hawks). Still a lot of game and lots of season left to play, but both the Hawks & Cavs are going in completely different directions this year than I thought they would.
I am starting to believe it especially with how poorly Miami is playing. I want to see how long they sustain their play, but it's looking like getting rid of Josh Smith was addition by subtraction like Toronto did last year with Rudy Gay.
You have Toronto, Washington, Atlanta & Chicago as stone cold locks. No matter what happens the rest of the way, those 4 teams will definitely be in the playoff field, most likely the top 4 in some order but at the least (Atlanta's most likely to drop probably) no worse than 5th/6th.
Then we have Cleveland who's about as close of a lock as possible without actually being a lock. I'll give them a couple more weeks before I add them into the "lock" category. Remember, they now are as close to out of the playoffs as they are to the #1 in the East (6.5 behind Atlanta for first, and 6.5 in front of Indy for 9th). So that's 5 of the 8 playoff teams right there. Then we subtract 2 teams (the Knicks and Sixers) who will likely both be officially eliminated by the All Star Break, but both teams are already pretty much eliminated. So, that should leave us with 8 teams: Miami, Brooklyn, Miami, Indy, Boston, Orlando, Charlotte, & Detroit battling it for the last 3 spots to become fodder for one of the top 3. As of now I'd say Brooklyn is looking pretty good for one of those 3, so realistically you have 7 teams for 2 spots, and realistically any of those 7 could take it. If it was a bet between the Pistons vs. the field I'd definitely take the field because I have more options, but if it's between either Detroit or Miami or Detroit vs. Charlotte I'd probably take the Pistons on that bet.
First of all, the Cavs implosion continues as the Sixers (the Sixers!!!!!!!!!!!) beat them for Philly's first home win of the season!!!!!!!!!!! The Sixers previous 4 wins all came away from home.
Second of all, the Cavs finally got rid of Waiters but acquired J.R. "brick-layer" Smith in return (also got Iman Shumpert; Waiters went to OKC and a bunch of expirings are going to the Knicks as Phil has finally raised the white flag), so I'm not sure they actually got better in regards to Waiters vs. Smith. The one redeeming quality Waiters had over Smith was at least he came cheap. Shumpert will be a nice addition off the bench as he can give them defense on the wing and the permiter, but I have a feeling Smith will cause more headaches than usefulness.
I feel sorry for any Knicks fan that paid top dollar for tickets between now and April 15. They'll basically be seeing the Westchester Knicks (the Knicks new NBDL team) for NBA prices, Carmelo laughing all the way to bank as he shoots 5-35 every game (and will shoot enough bricks that he can actually build a new MSG with all of them) until the All Star game when he calls it quits....and then laughs it up on the bench when the team loses for the 40th time in 43 games and finished 10-72 this year.
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